


The Black Book

by anjak (mandrakefunnyjuice)



Category: Original Work
Genre: Cross-Post, Dark Humor, Gen, Naughty language, Original Characters - Freeform, Original Fiction, Original Plot, Satire, Urban Fantasy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-07
Updated: 2019-04-24
Packaged: 2019-06-23 12:44:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 25,813
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15606561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mandrakefunnyjuice/pseuds/anjak
Summary: The Colvilles have never been exactly “normal,” even by the standards of the outlandish world they live in. In a parallel reality chocked full of magic, possession, gnomes, and vampires, the Colville name stands out alone as the spotty black sheep in the white herd. However, being blacklisted by the magical community is one thing – the family is quite used to that, having had a reputation for the forbidden arts for several centuries. Getting kidnapped and ransomed by a vengeful vampire mafia is another matter.





	1. I

**Author's Note:**

> Hello. I'm also known as mandrakefunnyjuice. On Inkitt, the next few chapters of this story have already been posted. It is, as of yet, unfinished, and it is an original work. I'm aware that this might make a few people annoyed because this site is mostly used to share fandoms, but as a longtime fanfiction author, it would feel strange for me to not use A03's resources as a massive writer database to try and get some concrit from my work.
> 
> It's very long, and there's a lot of foul language. I'm mostly interested in concrit but any reviews at all would be helpful.
> 
> Before posting this, this story had not seen anyone's eyes outside of my inner circle. I'm releasing it to the public to try and net feedback. I hope you give it, and me a chance. Please, sit back, and venture on a journey of imagination...

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Friday Colville has a not so average life, and a not so average secret.

“Look at that bitch.”  
  
My godfather Scott (he’s a vampire, but not one of the creepy ones, he’s just a moocher who lives in our basement) pointed accusingly at the woman on the television - Ann Creedy, news anchor/journalist, who has the dubious honor of sporting the worst platinum-bleached news-cut this reality has ever seen. I can’t even describe it properly because words fail me every time I look at it. Scott and I were sitting on the couch avidly watching the news, which is codeword for being lazy. He was the one who was actually watching it; I was just sitting there. A report by Ann about a protest in Alabama for something had gotten me in a weirdly pensive mood, thinking about life, the world, the nature of magic, and the stupidity of it all.

Sometimes, I worry that I think too much.

“Look at her! Augh!” Scott made a guttural noise at the back of his throat in disgust. He winced and looked away from Ann Creedy’s face. “It’s the crap of nightmares.”

“But, you don’t have nightmares,” I pointed out. “You don’t even sleep.” Most vamps slip into a comatose state during the daytime, where they basically just lay there meditating like nerds in a coffin while they wait for the sun to go down so they can avoid being crispy-fried. Scott, he, well. He just plays MMOs.

“I do _sleep_ ,” he defended.

“You mean you nod off out of boredom, when you’re not playing that stupid game.”

“It counts. I just don’t _dream_. And don’t call my game stupid! It took hard work to gear up my four level-eighty PCs, and now I kick supreme ass, and I deserve to be proud of that. Quit yer bitchin’, Friday. I meant to say, if I _had_ nightmares,” he corrected, “I’d have them about her. She is a demon. A blonde news-demon.”

I remembered something relevant. “I heard that she’s on the waiting list for court possession.”

Scott’s face scrunched up in disgust. “What? Who’d wanna possess _that?_ ”

“I dunno,” I shrugged, “a demon of bad haircuts?”

“I see what you did there,” Scott conceded, and we shared a celebratory fist bump.

Scott slurped noisily from his Big Gulp cup - I glanced inside to see what was in it, but looked away quickly. Something slushy and dark red. Vamptastic. “Seriously though,” he eventually continued, raising the remote and muting the TV so we wouldn’t have to listen to more of Creedy’s dreary droning, “they should just fire her. Why do they keep that wig around? I don’t get it. Where’d you hear she signed on for possession?”

I shrugged. “Um, the Internet.”

“Ah. You know, that’s almost believable.”

I grinned. “Isn’t it though? Can you imagine her being interrogated by a fucking Goo-rat, then twisting her head around going all,” I screwed up my face, raised my raptor claws, rolled my eyes up into the back of the head and rasped out, “Nomen mihi Legio est, quia multi sumus!”

He gave my performance a thumbs-up. “Nice. Yeah, that seems like something that bitch would do. Who signs up for demonic possession anyway? Other than lonely newscasters with horrible hair,” he added.

“Demon worshipers, the categorically insane, door-to-door vacuum salesmen looking to get rich,” I ticked off my fingers, “girl scouts looking to up their cookie sales, satanists . . .”

Scott looked up thoughtfully at the den’s coffered blue ceiling, red eyes flashing in the din. “I bet politicians do it,” he finally said after a while. “State senators. Maybe not Congressmen, since they have more to live for, but a State senator would be totally believable. Like, if Randy Lowe - you know that guy who has all those tacky picket signs all over Main? If I heard he was scheduled for possession, I wouldn’t even bat an eye. State senators seem like the kind of shit-heads who would get possessed because they got fuck-all to live for and think it’s some kind of fucked-up public service. But if you told me some, I dunno, one of the Congressmen was getting the ol’ Linda Blair? I’d be like, no. No way. That’s how come there’s so many skeletons out there, running around outside of closets, man.”

I raised an eyebrow in confusion. “Uh, what?”

Scott blinked. “That got away from me a little. What was I saying?”

I shrugged. “State senators signing up for court possession. It makes sense, I’d buy that.”

Scott rubbed his pale chin in thought, then snapped his fingers. “I bet Rob Schneider would do it.”

Insert derisive snort. “If he hasn’t already.”

“Oh, totally.”

“Andy Dick, too.”

“Gotta be!”

“There’s no other explanation!”

“Dude, I agree.” His eyes flashed in the light when his pupils dilated, and he turned on the couch to look at me more intently, like he was about to get serious. “Speaking as a vampire, by the way, I disavow that man from my species. He’s gotta be some kind of ghoul by this point. He has to be faking everyone out. It’s like the eighth time people have thought he was dead, and then the next day, someone calls the news, and there’s some idiot on his phone catching Andy Dick, wandering around high outside of a Quiznos, not even remembering that he’s supposed to be fucking dead!” At this point, he sounded pissed off at something, and snorted derisively, falling back to his original sitting position on the tufted navy sofa. “I don’t buy it. He’s either a demon, or a secret zombie.”

I slouched back into the couch we were sitting on to get more comfortable, and felt like I was melting into the plush blue suede. “I had a dream two nights ago that he, that Andy Dick, he was an alien, right? And I got beamed up onto a starship and he told me I was the Chosen One or something, who was supposed to save his race? And that I had to go on this quest for this, uh, this amulet. No wait, it was a magic scarf.”

“Magic scarf,” Scott scoffed, taking a big, noisy slurp from his cup.

“Yeah. But in the dream,” I emphasized, because for some reason I felt the need to emphasize this point, and even threw in an emphatic hand movement, so it wouldn’t be misconstrued.

“In the dream.”

“My dream about Andy Dick being an alien.”

He nodded, and I honestly couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic or not. “Right.”

I continued: “So he beams me up to this starship, reveals that he’s an alien, which I was not surprised about, at all, because if anyone is secretly an alien it’s definitely Andy Dick. But anyway, he tells me I’m supposed to go on this quest, and I told him to screw off, and then all the aliens pulled out these lasers and threatened to shoot me with them, and I walked off all badass-like because I knew they knew that they couldn’t do shit, since I was their Reluctant Messiah, and then I woke up just as their home planet exploded and the magic scarf was strangling me to death, only when I woke up, I was tangled in my sheets.”

Scott blinked. “Lasers?”

“In my dream, they looked more like Next-Gen phasers, but yeah,” I nodded.

“I’ve always thought that those looked more like electric shavers than what a phaser should look like,” he criticized with a frown.

“Well how would you know what a phaser should look like? They don’t exist!”

Scott slammed his giant cup down. “I know enough to know they aren’t supposed to look like space-age vibrators, Friday!” He roared. “Weapons shouldn’t look like marital aids!”

There was a moment of awkward silence, broken only by Scott’s noisy slurping. Gradually he reached the bottom of his bloody slushy, to which I was grateful for. One of my pet peeves is noisy slurping. Scott knew this, and did it specifically to irritate me. I didn’t get too mad since it was kind of our thing - we’d go out of our way to piss off the other and push each other’s buttons, just for the sake of picking fights. None of it was really heartfelt, we just have fun passing the time by being irritating dicks to each other.

“What were we talking about again? I forget,” Scott confessed after several seconds of silence. I opened my mouth to respond, but realized that I had forgotten too, and let out a vague ‘bleuh.’ Same thing we always talk about, Scott. Virtually nothing. In some ways, Scott was more like an annoying vampire brother than a godfather. To be honest, as much as I love my dad, Scott had been there for me more than Marcus Colville. Though I loved my parents, I hadn’t often found myself sitting comfortably in silence with either of them in years. To me, real love is silence.

We sat there in the den for two hours, doing everything between jack and shit. Most of my evenings went like this, when I wasn’t hanging out with Ness. Scott and I let a rich, fulfilling life, as you can see. It was a nice change of pace from what everyone in the family was doing after Dad’s fiasco with the mafia years ago, when all the death threats came in. I had been a different kid back then, all precocious and rosy-cheeked, but now I go out of my way to find new and inventive ways to butcher time, whether that’s sitting around pretending to watch the news, playing pranks on Aunt Lil, exploding garden gnomes, or midnight hijinks around Blackwood.

Besides, it was a Tuesday evening, and there was nothing to do but watch TV and talk about nothing. Could be worse. Something dramatic could be happening. Almost as that thought occurred to me, Erik burst into the room.

Now, Erik’s a pint-sized piece of jerky. He’s nine years old, turning ten this year, and is smarter than I am, which isn’t fair goddamn it. It was all over the news when we found out about his alternate personality-slash-past-life Vladislaus, since having a split personality with one of your past lives was an almost unheard-of condition; the fact that it just _had_ to be the scion of the Colville line didn’t help our positive publicity. There is a cult somewhere in San Diego that thinks my brother is the herald of the End Times, and that when he’s older, he’ll user in the destruction of the world. It’s cute.

Seeing Erik burst into the den and start shrieking about butchering Turks in a heavy Transylvanian accent, hoisting an ego the size of a man three times Erik’s body weight and throwing paraphernalia around the room in a temper tantrum, was a pretty normal, although annoying, event. Vlad wasn’t so bad most days, but every now and then he’d pop out, take over, and throw a fit. It must suck, being an ancient dead conqueror, trapped in a nine-year-old’s body. I feel for Vlad, I really do, but I saw no reason for him to be so nasty about it.

Anyway, Erik burst into the room, snatched the remote out of Scott’s hand and hurled it across the floor and started shrieking. When he gets into his ‘Vlad’ mode he gets this eerie, layered, choral voice - you can hear Erik’s normal voice beneath it, the voice of the nine-year-old nerd who is my little brother, but over it is the echo of the deep and menacing voice of Vladislaus, Voivoide of Wallachia. I don’t remember when I got used to hearing it.

Scott took Vlad’s entrance as his cue to leave and vamp-sped out the room, leaving only the trail of a red baseball-capped blur, which I thought was incredibly unfair. “You filthy traitor!” I yelled after him.

I debated whether or not it was worth it to try and calm Vlad down, or just leave. He shrieked something at me in his native language that I didn’t understand, and I wished that our Dad was there, since Dad spoke fluent Romanian. I valiantly resisted the urge to just jet and hide up in my room until Erik’s episode was over and done with; sighed, and went to work.

“Hey! Hey!” I projected myself from the couch and slid in my woolen socks across the hardwood floor, nearly slipping to a halt in front of my little brother. I bent over, raising my arms to placate the chief turd. “Hey, you! Chill! Alright? Just relax!”

He stopped in his fit briefly to look at me, scowled darkly, and began to pace and mutter to himself.

I inched my way closer, but he stopped in his pacing to glare at me even more darkly when he saw what I was trying to do. I held up my hands palm-outward and twisted my face into the best innocent expression I could manage. “Hey, no! Whoa. It’s okay. There’s nothing to be upset about, uh, that I know of. So just calm down, okay? There’s no good reason to go into a fit and throw shit. Around the room,” I gesticulated in a circular motion for emphasis, “Alright? Alright. Are we good? No? We’re not? We’re still an angry Slav? We’re not good? We more time to calm down? That’s alright too . . .” I gave Vlad what I thought was an encouraging thumbs-up.

“ _Idi vilo!_ ” Vlad jumped back from me, spitting in disgust.

I racked my brain, trying to remember what Dad told me about Slavic language. I’d never bothered to learn because most of the time, Erik was just plain Erik. Vlad was just a nuisance we had to deal with maybe twice a week for a few hours and—

“Hey, I’m not a witch!” I snapped, then mentally slapped myself. I had just then remembered what ‘vilo’ meant. I couldn’t cast a cantrip to save my life. It’s been that way ever since I was little - all magic has a tendency to just roll off of me like water. It’s a point of embarrassment, actually - everyone in my family, along with both of my Uncles on my Dad’s side and my mom’s two younger sisters can all do magic. I come from a long and storied line of pretty powerful magic-users. If my dud-status ever makes its way to dinner table conversation, it’s always hush-hush. We don’t talk about it in public, either, but what can I do? I just don’t think about it. The hardcore stuff is all innate, and runs hot in the blood of old families with long and storied magical histories - like mine. I’m a black sheep twice over.

The umbra of Vlad’s soul overshadowing my brother’s own gazed back at me from Erik’s green eyes, staining his irises yellow and black. I involuntarily shivered. “ _Stricată vrajitoarea_ ,” he growled. “ _Coprnjice_! _Beng tasser tute. Un copil este un nenorocitule dar nu are constiinta de ea . . . Prosti, toate de tine!_ ”

I groaned, bored of this already. “I don’t know what you’re saying exactly, but I bet it wasn’t nice! Unless it was nice, in which case thank you for the compliment, you Slavic jacka—”

“ _The understatement of my century,_ ” Vlad spat out, this time in English, thank the Gods. I glared back at him and stuck out my tongue. “ _And they call dis Erik a child._ ” I’d always found it funny, they way Vlad referred to himself - as Erik, my brother. They were technically the same person, but Vlad always talked about Erik as someone else, since they shared different memories. He always said it real funny too, because of his thick accent. ‘Err-eek.’ It made me giggle.

My giggling set Vlad off again though, and he started throwing another tantrum. I’d often wondered what the guy had been like in his previous life, and if he really threw tantrums this often. It was probably just a condition of being the ghostly stick stuck up Erik’s pasty, prepubescent butt.

Somewhere amidst tiny Count Dracula’s stomping and screaming, I heard a ghostly shrill from upstairs, and promptly gave up. Great going Vlad, I thought, you woke up Aunt Lil. At that point, I stopped trying to calm Vlad down and fled from the living room, running up the stairs and towards my room in the east wing, closing and locking the door behind me.

The historical Colville manor was a lot smaller than its current incarnation, but it had always been dark and gloomy, like its residents. You wouldn’t find a scrap of lace or frill in this place. I don’t think anything like that would last here for more a minute. If it’d ever looked differently, Aunt Lilith would’ve raised a hissy fit; she was a spirit who liked her doom and gloom.

My room is the first door in the upstairs east wing of the manor. It was originally supposed to be a sitting parlor, if the chandelier hanging over the foot of my bed and showy furniture is any indicator. My ‘closet’ is less of a closet and was modified from an adjoining room, which actually enters out into the main hallway and is accessible by a door that blends into the wall. It’s too big for half of what I actually own, but I think it’s kinda neat - it’s always been my secret spy room. My room has been mine my whole life, and it’s gone through a lot of phases - my childhood ballerina phase, my short-lived bohemian phase, and now my final phase which seems to be less of a ‘phase’ and more like hallmark of the end of all phases, which I like to refer to as “blah.” “Blah” is a state of being one enters when one can’t be bothered with anything stupid anymore. “Blah”-ness is my nirvana.

A lunatic with a sniper rifle tried to kill my little brother and I when we were at Jorgensen Park when I was fourteen. My Dad - the world-class warlock, who used to instruct other professionals like himself on the keener points of ley-magic - stopped the bullet in the air and shot it back at the sniper with his mind. It hit the perpetrator in the knee and blew the man’s leg off. He survived the experience only to die in the hospital. I like to fault the penny I threw down our wishing well for that one. I think if anyone is entitled to become “blah”-like before their time, it’s me. I’ve earned that.

So, when I say that my room is pretty blah, you can understand what I really mean. One whole side of my room is covered in books, and over half of them are irreplaceable antiques. I keep the expensive ones shelved behind glass, and the other ones are stacked as tightly together as I could possibly put them. Not all of them fit on the shelves, so they get stacked on the floor in corners. I have more books than I do anything else, and I’ve read all of them at least twice. The other side of the room contains a writing desk, two carved walnut host chairs that are amazingly uncomfortable to sit in, and an enormous medieval tapestry that covers the wall. It wasn’t my choice, but I don’t have the heart to get rid of it - also I literally can’t get rid of it. It hides the secret door that opens to the closet-room. It’s probably actually worth something, and isn’t totally aesthetically displeasing; the detailed tapestry depicts a colorful bearded king and a bunch of dirty serfs all cowering before some winged, human-like archangels, who are pointing accusatory fingers and scowling at a bunch of bat-winged blue and black demons made of starry shadow lurking at the bottom of the tapestry, underneath the Earth’s crust; who look suitably pissed off at all the finger-pointing going on and seem to be extending their forked tongues as a form of protest. If I had to guess, it was an Angelican thing. I don’t understand it at all. Seems to me that medieval artists wasted a lot of time trying to humanize big concepts like devas, never once considering the fact that comparing such vast beings to us is like comparing us to algae. I have no idea where the tapestry came from or who put it there, but I hate it to freaking _death_. It’s been there my entire life. I’ve asked my parents to remove it time and time again, but they keep forgetting, and I’ve now just accepted the creepy tapestry. It’s what I must live with. Don’t ask me how many times I’ve tried to tear the ugly thing down. I’ve set it on _fire_ and it put _itself_ out. It’s stuck to my wall with magic or something.

My other wall, facing my bed, is a giant window bisected by a French door, which opens up to a balcony that overlooks the southern half of the Colville property. It has a lovely view of our ancestral graveyard and statuary. There’s no other decor, beyond a painting of a snowy scene near the door, a table lamp on the desk, and a giant black shag rug that I stuck on the floor near the bed because it doesn’t match anything, it makes me laugh, and it’s groovy.

All in all, I think my room suits me. It’s a pretty good reflection of who I am. I didn’t run away from Vlad’s tirade and Aunt Lil’s ghastly wrath to find solace in my room, however.

I have a secret. A special secret that, in a way, ran in the family - a secret I’ve kept under two floorboards underneath the left side of my bed, now beneath the rug, ever since I was precocious young lass.

When I was eleven, and ongoing until I turned thirteen, our family had a bullseye painted on our heads by the vampire mafia. This isn’t news. It was all because of my father’s involvement in the Scipio Trials, which took place during that time; the aftermath, which involved the final death of the vampire lord Scipio, resulted in the entire Colville family becoming a delicious, saucy feast for vampires to fancy. I was taken out of private school and given even more exclusive private tutoring for those short years, which wasn’t all that special even though it sounds like it is. All school is as boring as dirt. Those few years, I spent more than half of my time running around the house with Scott raising hell, pestering Aunt Lil, riling up Vlad, playing pranks on the locals, and gnome-hunting. The rest of the time (when I wasn’t being schooled), before Scott would rise, I would spend my time exploring. That’s how I found a way into the east attic.

The eastern attic is, by the way, utterly forbidden for everyone. Totally _verboten._ It’s been blocked off ever since my serial-killer black-witch great-grandmother, Sandra Colville, and her creepy dark magic cabal committed all their crimes and did their dirty deeds up in it. It’s especially forbidden to eleven-year-old girls who do not know anything about magic. There isn’t even an official door that opens up into the attic anymore - the winding black iron stairs that used to lead up to it lead to nowhere. Where once there was a door, there is a seamless ceiling, which I have to assume was Dad’s doing. I never asked, because I was worried if I did ask they’d ask why I was asking, and I can _not_ lie to my father. (It’s impossible, I’ve tried. Not only is he my Dad, but he’s actually a really talented lawyer. Imagine being cross-examined by the Devil’s Advocate, but you’re six, and you are actually guilty of stealing some cookies, but it’s too late because you already tried to cover your ass by blaming your brother, but Dad sees right through you and catches you, and you go down hard, and have to serve twenty years without probation because being a child in my household was like being in a kangaroo court where you have no rights but you’re only guilty if you lie in the first place.)

For anyone curious enough, there’s a secret entrance to be found in the east wing. The room juxtaposed to the east attic’s black-iron stairwell is nothing more than an extra-large hall-closet, along with an old fashioned laundry chute. Except the laundry chute doesn’t lead _down_ to the laundry room, it leads _up_ to the attic. Don’t ask me why. My guess is, Great-Grandma Colville installed it. Not for any practical reason, but as a prank, so she could dump condoms filled with expired cottage cheese on unsuspecting someones down the chute on the bottom floor, and get a giggle out of their stinky misfortunes. It’s what I would do. If I had a chute. That led out of my secret black magic room into a random room down below.

Anyway, the chute was just small enough for a skinny, lanky preteen to wriggle into and climb around in, and that’s just what eleven-year-old-me did. I clambered up that chute all the way to the attic, and boy howdy did I have a good time doing it. I liked to explore back then - by age five I’d learned every nook, cranny, and crevice of the property. Every corner, every artifact, every statue, every inscribed rune on every post, every name in the graveyard, and every laundry chute . . . Except for that one in the closet, which I had yet to investigate. When I found out what room I was in once I was out of the chute, I freaked. The _expressly-forbidden-by-Dad room_ , Erik and I had called it. The _Bad-room._

Turns out, the room wasn’t so bad. A little dusty, but not too shabby. Dark and gloomy, like most things in our home. Quiet, and more than a little creepy, with some I-don’t-want-to-know-what-the stains soaked into the wood. There was only one window, a big ol’ round one, which overlooked the dense forest surrounding the grounds. (When I was still young enough to not be jaded by my own imagination, I used to pretend the forest was full of the lost Entwives; Tolkien was the first thing I learned how to read, when I was about three or four. Throwing some trivia about the Fry your way.)

Sandra’s attic was bare but for one thing: there was a big ol’ nifty chest propped up against the wall covered by a plaid blanket, likewise coated in dust, but not _as_ much dust. I wasn’t stupid enough not to notice that. Someone had put it there on purpose. Eleven-year-old-me pretended that whoever put it there did just for me, and I marched right on over to that dusty chest and opened it up (didn’t even have a lock, poorly guarded), and found a very interesting, very forbidden treasure waiting inside, just for me to discover.

Sandra Colville was renowned for her spell inventions. She never recorded them down, they were all locked away in her mental vault. She was a prodigy. She was also insanely evil, emphasis on the insane. Moreover, the Goo confiscated all of her spellwork materials upon her burning. Her grimoires and writings were all given to her ashes.

Except, they actually didn’t confiscate _all_ of her goodies. I made a fib.

They confiscated all but _one_ book. The book I found in that chest - as an eleven-year-old-girl intrigued by secrets, who found a secret entrance into the _expressly-forbidden-by-Dad-room_ and found another secret, which she kept for the last seven years underneath two special floorboards in her bedroom.

It’s common but never outright stated knowledge that I, the Cheese Fry, am a dud. Magic runs thick in the blood of my family, but I didn’t make the cut. Erik is pretty proficient with cantrips and basic summoning spells - like nonverbally levitating a pen into the air, or a conjuring a cool breeze on a hot day. He can make a ley-shield without giving himself a nosebleed, which is cool. It’s mostly little things. He’s great at those, and I’m really proud of him. One day he’ll be a magnificent warlock like our father. My father Marcus can summon entire thunderstorms if he wants to, stop bullets in mid-air, and bring buildings crashing down with mere thoughts. He also has a really neat fireball trick that he likes to show off at parties. He’s a licensed warlock, which means that he isn’t supposed to summon thunderstorms and strike his enemies down with lightning at all, except for in self-defense. He’s phenomenally powerful, but his licensing paperwork had an oh-wait-it’s-against-the-law-to-use-except-for-self-defense clause. Abuse magic, and you get the special honor of being labeled ‘reckless user’ and then the rest of your life becomes a sad, repetitive marathon of _Jailhouse Rock,_ sans Rock. The Goo ruins everything that’s fun. Mom, well, she’s not as prominent a figure in my life since I became a teeanger, but is pretty skilled at Earth magic. She seems to have a little talent for every branch, like a magical jack of all trades, though I think her focus is herbalism and divining. I gather it was always only a hobby for her, since it doesn’t tie into her career. My best friend Vanessa is into hoodoo. Her mother is a genuine witch doctor, and is easily the coolest person I’ve ever met.

I’m not so awesome. I can’t do any form of magic except for some one-liners. One-liner spells are simple incantation words, like the aqua one. Useful if you’re thirsty in the desert, or you feel like flinging some water droplets in your enemy’s face in the off chance that it’ll annoy them so much they’ll give up attacking you. Those types of spells don’t get any more advanced than that, and casting them repetitively is mentally draining, so they’re not all that practical. Some normies can do one-liners if they concentrate hard enough. Being able to cast a one-liner is just . . . It’s the most basic thing in the world. No one is allowed to be proud of it.

The upside to my being a dud is that magic also really has no effect on me - it bounces off of me completely, most of the time. One of the idiot kids in my sixth-grade class was illegally playing around with a flame he’d floated onto his fingers from a candle, and sent the flame from it flying right at my head - didn’t even singe my hair. It just bounced off me like a bouncy ball, and fizzled in the dirt. Everyone during recess got quiet after that. I thought it was the greatest thing, but the teacher thought that I’d done something, or that I was wearing a protective charm, and she upset when I wouldn’t tell her my secret. Unlike most kids who grow up in witchy families, _my_ Mom never had to douse me in holy water before heading off to school, or whatever it is magic-savvy parents are supposed to do (I don’t know). My parents know that magic hates me too much to affect me in any way. It hates me so much that it wants nothing to do with me, and all magic will literally go _out of its way_ to avoid me. That fireball would have rather died in the dirt than singe me, that’s how icky I am to it.

The thing is, if you don’t have magic, and you’re part of the magical world, you’re useless. Licensed magicians are a minority, but they’re not uncommon. One out of every twenty or so people has the talent for magic, but not every single one of those people are licensed; hedge witches and other statistical outliers are what comes of the ten to fifteen percent of magic-users not shackled and bound by the Goo. Magic is a common everyday staple; it’s too useful to ignore. Tracking a criminal down with a tracking spell is a lot quicker than endless hours of internet searching, so law enforcement hires independent casters all the time. One is required in most stations to be present at all times. Wards against damage or danger are essential, but a lot of them don’t work as well as they’re advertised. Actual working protective wards, good luck, and ‘love’ charms are prized and sold to the highest bidders. The multinational NiLo now mass-manufactures every enchanted object, ceremonial wand, dried herb, specialty chalk, working home security ward, or spell tool that you lay your eyes on - and they train magicians for exorbitant tuition on their international campuses, where Ethics in Magic is a required subject for every freshman.

Being useless is something I’ve gotten used to. I’m actually kind of fond of being useless now. If you’re useless, people don’t ask you to do stuff.

Anyway, the grimoire of Sandra’s that I discovered wasn’t full of your everyday magic. No hokey eco-friendly magic in this house. I memorized the entire book frontwards and back; I took notes of every disgusting, dirty, profane ritual she detailed in there. I copied down all the drawings she did of ritualistic dismemberments and disembowelments into my margins. I put the notes all in the most indecipherable code I could invent at that age (took _forever_ ), and stuffed them in a hollowed-out encyclopedia which I keep on one of my bookshelves. I have an actual journal that I keep, but I don’t ever write in it unless I hear a joke that I want to remember. I don’t let anybody read that thing and I write it all down in a different code, anyway. I mean, it’s useless information - you can’t learn anything personal about me from any of the crap I write down, but I was always told by Mother that a girl should always have her secrets. Even if those secrets are, as in my case, totally stupid.

A little-known fact about Sandra Colville, though, is that she wasn’t just infamous - she was brilliant. The dark rituals that Sandra practiced were empowering to her blood - the Colville blood. She literally infused the family blood with her magic. I don’t know why, or what she was aiming at by doing this - but it seems to have worked, in my Dad’s case. Everyone who came after Sandra was pretty powerful in their own right, ’specially the first-borns, minus yours truly. Why she did all of this is anyone’s guess; she didn’t write down her master plan in the margins of the book I found. (“Oh, here is a good spot to write down all my plans for world-domination! I’ll start by kidnapping the Prime Minister of India, and work up from there . . .”) I mean . . . just . . . that’s something _I’d_ do.

In addition to that, she wrote down entire lists in her grimoire of simple Latinized one-liner spells that she invented, which isn’t done. Ever. Sandra was the exception to every rule except the natural one. One-liner spells, like the one she was most infamous for, which exploded an entire squad of police with one word, and destroyed the entire attic. She didn’t write _that_ one down, unfortunately, but there were hundreds of other little useful ones, which I’ll hoard for myself and use for my own benefit, thank you, seeing as I’m the only one alive who now knows them and I’d probably get arrested if I shared any of my knowledge with anyone. Scott doesn’t even know about the grimoire of secrets, and he knows everything there is to know about me.

I’ve certainly never applied any of this knowledge, except for in using her one-liners. One of them, _prohibeo clamosa,_ turns wherever you are in into a soundless room - ironically, you have to kinda yell the word and clap. _Adcaligo_ causes the area around you to become blurry and distorted. _Obsfusco_ completes _adcaligo_ ’s job and completely eliminates all surrounding light, engulfing a targeted area in total darkness. You have to be careful not to cast them around electrical appliances, though, because they tend to short out electronics. Magic and technology historically don’t mix so well except when done by professionals. That last one will make light bulbs explode if I do it in a room with lights on.

So, yeah, I know black magic. Don’t tell anyone. It’s kind of a big deal, but only if anyone finds out about it, and no one has to know so long as your keep your fat mouth shut!

Wait.

Who am I talking to?


	2. II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A dynamic duo becomes a trio.

When I ran upstairs to escape Aunt Lil’s ghost-fit, I pried the special floorboards loose and pulled out Sandra’s secret book for a look-see. I normally didn’t take the leather-bound grimoire out unless I wanted to study it or I needed to look up something; since I’d memorized most of the damn thing, I didn’t really need to do that anymore. Except for study, sometimes I would take the big, Gutenberg-sized black bible out and pet it.  Like a cat.

No, I don’t do that. I’m kidding. I did like to look at it sometimes - not read it, just _look_ at it, to make sure it was still there and stayed secret and safe. It’s not like I huddle under my bed and stroke my grandmother’s evil book that I found when I was a kid, whispering to myself in the dark, ‘my precious,’ or anything. I just liked to assure myself every now and then that my secret things stay secret and everything is in its right place, like a security blanket. I didn’t like taking the book out and reading it because I didn’t need to do that all the time, but I liked to know that it was always there, just in case I did need it for whatever reason. I liked the assurance. I actually didn’t own a lot of personal shit, but the things I did own I took good care of; the things that I _found_ , however, I’m more attached to than anything money could ever buy. I’m the kid who sees a pretty rock and decides to collect it and keep it in his pocket - he doesn’t play with it every second of every day, but it’s nice, toting that rock around, carrying it with you on various imaginary journeys. Sometimes the kid doesn’t take the rock with him on his little adventures; sometimes his grumpy mom forces him to leave it, but he knows where it is - under his pillow, in his bed, safe and sound - and that knowledge is a slice of happy pie.

I guess it must’ve been pretty late in the evening by the time I went upstairs - it _was_ dark outside - so I found myself waking up half-sprawled across my canopy bed with my chest uncomfortably squishing my secret book, The Doors blaring insistently from my phone’s alarm clock. I even remember falling asleep. You’d think I would’ve put my grandmother’s Evil Book of Dark Magic™, in case someone was spying. Not that anyone would do that . . . That I know of . . .

“Boooooooo,” I moaned, slapping my alarm off. I grabbed the nearest pillow I could find so I could bury my face into its feathery goodness, and I cursed Jim Morrison’s sexy voice for waking me up. I inevitably dragged my tired butt out of bed and stuffed the Bad-book where it belonged, back in its hiding place, and went about my rituals.

I have a specific and orderly routine that I go through in the mornings. I won’t go into the inane details, but if I didn’t do my routine, I would be crabby for the rest of the day. It’s a little like wearing underwear that doesn’t match, or having a bad night terror, or being unable to eat breakfast. I’m aware that I can be obsessive compulsive. My little routines, my books on their shelves, my music, the coding of my notes, etc. I have to have control of some little things or I go ape-shit and start setting things on fire, or throwing things at people. Things like chairs, or pillows, or books, or children.

When I looked at myself in the bathroom mirror, I yelped because I startled myself. I forgot what I looked like, so for a split second, I had to deal with the surreal sight of a total stranger in my mirror before realizing I was being dumb. I threw my mass of microbraids into a messy bun and went through my morning grooming routine. Once I was finished with the last line of eyeliner, I threw on a black shirt and a military anorak, laced up my boots, and then I was ready to face society.

One of the numerous plus sides to being rich enough to throw money at whatever you want is that you’ll never not have a nice car. My fifteenth birthday present, which I wasn’t allowed to drive until I was sixteen, was a cherry red F-type Jaguar. It’s a beautifully sleek beast, and I never drive it. It’s unofficially Scott’s car, not that he goes anywhere in it; because Mom took issue with Dad buying a teenager a car that can go zero to sixty in four point two seconds, he responded that he could’ve just give me _his_ Aston Martin, but hadn’t done that because it wasn’t a “learning car” and he figured that particular brand could wait until I was “at least eighteen.” So, I got to pick out a bright orange Mini a few weeks later instead, because I like orange and no one would ever steal an orange car, right? Anyway, that’s the one I drive, and this all worked out in my Mom’s mind.

I don’t think anyone in my family, myself included, understand in the least how “normal” people basically function. Proof: my Dad has two Rolls-Royces, both are company cars, one of which is a limo that he uses primarily for business and it has a driver installed named Bubba. (I don’t actually know his real name, I never cared enough to ask.) Bubba used to pick me up from school in that limo on Dad’s orders before I had my Mini, and one time Dad saw a soccer mom pull up to the nearby elementary school to pick up her bratty children. Now, my father has never attended a public school. I don’t think he’d ever even sniffed at one, til I asked him if I could attend one. He was more open-minded than his own parents, and allowed me to choose the kind of school I wanted to go to once it was safe, because he had never had a choice in the matter when he was young, and said that he’d wished otherwise. Marcus Colville went to the types of stuffy boarding schools where you only meet people whose parents are from the same socio-economic strata as your parents. After grade school, he traveled to England to attend Oxford as part of an international law program, and ended up liking it there, and stayed for a while.

That day, from the stoplight, my dad was watching that random woman scramble to load up her unruly brood into her Sedan, and he asked out loud, “Those children seem ill-behaved - look, they aren’t even assisting their mother with her task. Why wouldn’t she simply hire a manservant to do this for her?”

Once I got over my fit of giggles over the idea that my father still used the word ‘manservant’ in conversation, I had to tell him, “No, see Dad, I think she’s got a zillion kids. I don’t think she can afford a driver. Though I’m sure she’d like one. Probably would make her life easier.”

And then Dad looked confused, or sad, or pitiful, and said, “That’s a shame. I don’t think I will ever understand the lower-to-upper-middle-classes.” And then we drove off, and he ordered Bubba to get us ice cream.

I don’t know, maybe because I’m the only one in my family who’s gone to a public school, but I tend to see things a little differently than the rest. All the other kids in Blackwood (there’s only about three) go to the same private school and don’t seem any happier than the kids at my school. Then again, they used to beat me up when we went to the same middle school, so fuck those elitist pricks. Really, down to it, I’m in the same bracket, and Vanessa makes fun of me for it all the time. I, at least, try not to smear my money in people’s faces.

I literally ran to my car, in a rush to get out of the building before my little brother could wake up. Sometimes, I was asked to drop him off at his private school, and I just was not in the mood that morning to deal with Erik’s butt. He was such a morning person, and there’s nothing I hate more than a morning person. Except for cats. So, I hopped in my car and sped out of the driveway like Speed Racer. I stopped to get coffee at a kiosk off the road a bit before I pulled into the school; I have a low opinion of schools, so I wasn’t in a big rush.

On a random note, pretty sure my high school’s parking lot was designed my meth-addled girl scouts who had minimal knowledge at best of public zoning and landscaping. Clearly, no form of logical sense went into its design. I almost wished that I had requested an off-road vehicle for my birthday instead of a Mini, that way I could just drive over the dividers and save myself the fifteen minutes at the end of the school day it took to get out of the damned parking lot.

Before I stepped out of my obnoxious orange vehicle to go to damn school like a good, responsible girl, I checked my phone for texts. Sometimes, Nessa would ask me to pick her up. Well, she wouldn’t really ask. If I heard nothing from her that meant that she was walking. She didn’t live that far away from the campus.

I had to run back to the car when I forgot my notebook; I only carry one notebook from class to class these days. I don’t use the textbooks they give me, they just stay in my locker. Actually, I don’t have a locker. Or I do, I don’t know. Uh, it’s probably somewhere in the school, or more likely it got swallowed by a black hole. My locker is located in the back seat of my car, also known as the floorboards. I figure, the only thing you need a textbook for is math, and since as a senior at Cartaligna High, home of the Stallions, I don’t have to take math anymore, so I can just wing it. Hell, the provided textbooks never taught me anything, and everyone ignores my existence, so I don’t have to read along in class or anything ever. It’d be completely pointless without Nessa. I’ve never seen the point of school, except for maybe in the social aspect; the social aspect, which I did not partake in. I never learn anything there that I haven’t first picked up in one of my books. I love learning and acquiring new knowledge; I’m a true Colville in that respect - the family motto is _Conscientia potentia est_ — Knowledge is Power. Marcus, my dad, embodies this creed; learn, maneuver, gain power, and then it won’t matter if people hate you - you’ll be the one with all the playing cards.

I meandered into school and checked my wristwatch for the time. Five minutes after; first period had already started. That meant nothing. Everyone was always late to everything here, and no one but me owned a watch.

Unfortunately, I was too busy zoning out to notice that on my way to F Hall for first period history, I nearly walked head-first into one of the nearby pillars. I would’ve had a concussion if an ebony-skinned hand hadn’t grabbed the hood of my anorak and yanked me backwards, causing me to stumble.

“Watch it, dork-job!” Vanessa cackled. I whipped around to face her feeling grateful, annoyed, and relieved all at once.

“I watch it,” I defended, pouting. “I watch it all night long!”

She rolled her dark eyes and shifted her blue shoulder bag to her other shoulder. “You watch nothing all night long. Maybe reruns. The occasional German porno.”

“Oh, shut up,” I groused. “Go eat a bagel!”

She blinked. “Eat a _bagel?_ Did yo-did you just tell me to go eat a bagel? That’s what you’re going with? Eat a _bagel?_ ”

“Nobody knows how to shut up anymore,” I growled under my breath and snatched her arm, dragging our asses off to class. “Shutting up is a dead art, like wry humor, or miming.”

“I can’t believe you,” she whispered, still in stunned disbelief after we’d sat down in the back of our class. “You’re completely unbelievable. I don’t believe you - I _won’t_.”

“What’s not to believe? I could’ve said, ‘kiss my ass.’ Would you have preferred that? Okay, kiss my ass then.”

She took out her blue phone from her bag and began to type something into it while chuckling. “I’m quoting you on this. I refuse to let you live this down. I’ll never forget the morning that you told me off by telling me to eat a delicious bagel. I don’t _believe_ you. I like bagels. Oh man. I’m hungry now, why’d you have to bring up bagels? I didn’t have breakfast…”

“Oh, be quiet.” In my defense, my retorts just pop out. I was thinking about food at the time, but was also reaching for an insult, and that was what my heart went with.

“Go eat a bagel,” she snipped back, chuckling under her breath.

The school day went by like an unpleasantly strong breeze. It didn’t last long enough to be irritating, but it was mildly irritating that it happened at all. I was proud to say that I didn’t pay attention in a single one of my classes, being far too busy doodling in my singular notebook to give any attention to my teachers. The law said I had to go to class, or I wouldn’t bother showing up at all. High school and I had a delicate relationship - it didn’t pay attention to me, so I didn’t pay attention to it, and all was well. Teachers’ eyes glossed over when they came across my name on the roll call; I was never once called upon to give an answer in class, or demonstrate a task. Whenever group projects were assigned, I was partnered with Vanessa every time without fail. If anyone happened to bump into me in the halls, they mumbled an apology and ran away from me without even looking me in the eye. I was used to it, though it still bothered Vanessa sometimes. I figured, hey, better than getting stuff thrown at me or called mean and creative names like when I was a kid in private school. That only happened for a brief period when I was a child; as soon as I started attending public High School, things changed and I started being ignored instead of targeted. I welcomed the change of pace.

This was my routine - what I’d grown up with, the treatment that I’d become accustomed to. It was a routine that I’d become comfortable with. I didn’t enjoy it, I didn’t hate it, it just was. Nessa and I had ended up just agreeing to disagree over my blasé attitude about it, because no amount of talking about a thing has ever changed my mind.

Hard as it may be for someone like Vanessa to understand, but my routines existed for a reason. It was very logical, and simple: when you live an unstable life, you become an unstable sort of person, and unstable sorts of people crave routine and stability like Nessa craves chocolate before she’s menstruating, which is how I always know when it is coming, and it never stops freaking her out and making me laugh. My routines were the only source of stability I had; the security I felt from living in my routines was my solitary link to sanity. Other people who are sane don’t think too much about insanity, but insanity runs thick in the Colville blood. I had grown up with the instinctive fear that I would one day turn into my great-grandmother, or worse. Plus, you know. All the assassination and kidnapping attempts. “Stranger danger” doesn’t even begin to cover the subject. I trusted everyone as far as my father could Judo-throw them.

Wednesday, during lunch, a break in my routine occurred that momentarily made me question my sanity. It had been a perfectly normal Wednesday for me, right up until the point when a blond boy’s blue eyes met mine from across the quad. Everyone outside of my one friend and family avoided eye contact with me entirely, so you can understand my confusion.

“Who’s that?”

“Huh?”

I gestured in _his_ direction with my chin, since my hands were occupied opening a can of soda. “That. Over there. Who is that.”

Nessa looked over in the direction I indicated, and her brown eyes widened in surprise. She blinked and scratched at her hairline. “The new senior? The one we had first period with, and he was introduced in front of everybody? Everybody has been talking about him ever since?”

“Who’s ‘everybody?’”  
  
“Oh my god, I just talked with you about him before we came out here for lunch,” Nessa huffed irritably.

I was genuinely confused. “ . . . Did this happen _today,_ or . . . ?”

“Yes!” She snapped. “You don’t remember _any_ of that?”

One of my eyebrows crawled up my forehead. “Uh, Ness?”

“Sorry, I forgot who I was talking to for a second.”

“Duh.”

Vanessa rolled her eyes at me as she ripped a chunk of her sandwich with her teeth, and chewed thoughtfully. “You have the worst memory out of anyone I’ve ever met, you know that?”

“My memory is _perfect_ ,” I insisted with a glare, sipping at the can.

“Okay, fine, so your memory is eerie, but you have the _worst_ attention span. Anyway, that’s Lorcan Halloway. I’m surprised you weren’t paying attention - I mean, like, everyone’s been all, ‘waaah!’ -about him being here.” She emphasized this with jazz hands, which I thought was wholly unnecessary. “Though I bet you fiiiive-teen, ten bucks that everyone’ll be over him by next week.”

The entire time Nessa had been talking, I’d been maintaining creepy eye contact with the new kid. Why was he staring at me? Nobody stares at me. Maybe he was staring at my hair? I tugged on the end of my big braid that Nessa had given me earlier, made up of my hundreds of microbraids. Maybe he was staring at me because I was unusual-looking. I played out a thrilling little fantasy in my head of stabbing Lorcan’s two pretty blue eyeballs out with a spork. “Why, ’cuz he’s got a British accent? Big deal, my dad has one of those,” I scoffed.

“Irish accent,” Vanessa corrected.

“What?”

“He’s Irish. Halloway’s from Ireland, so he’s got an Irish accent,” she told me. “Your dad isn’t British, he just went to Oxford and lived in England for a solid third of his life, and has a case of stiff-upper-lip because of it.”

I frowned. “Why do you know more about my parents than I do? That’s just—”

“Because I pay attention when people tell me things—”

“—creepy, Vanessa, just _creepy_ —”

“—would you just shut up and stop interrupting me for once,” she snapped, and I shut up dutifully. I couldn’t repress the smirk on my face, though, and she playfully punched me in the arm. I think Vanessa didn’t realize what ‘playfully’ meant, so she ended up actually punching me pretty hard, but I took it with a smile. Attention is attention, right?

She eventually continued: “Anyway, he’s from Ireland, he moved here with his family, and, oh, I forgot, his family owns and runs Ni-Lo. He’s basically a prince and when he turns eighteen, he’s going to be the richest teenager in the entire world. What he’s doing here at _this_ crappy public school in the States is beyond me. I mean. There’s probably some diabolical reason for it that us ‘lesser folk’ aren’t privy to, but seriously, who cares? Who even cares about that crap?” She laughed and bit into her sandwich.

Something about this didn’t add up in my head. “Wait, wait. I thought we agreed that the richest kid in the world would have to be the lovechild of Bill Gates and Christy Walton.”

Ness swallowed her bite and considered this, stroking an imaginary beard that grew out a good foot from her chin. “Point. But, that child is only a theory existing in the realm of our twisted imaginations. Halloway’s net worth is less than Gates and Walton, I think, by a margin of at least fifteen billion, from what Forbes said. And I guess he wouldn’t inherit all the money, just control over the family’s shares of Niall-Logan, which are only worth what the stock market decides they’re worth in the morning after the stock market is done doing its dirty— hey, don’t give me that look, I looked all this up on my phone two seconds ago while you were staring at the new guy. I still can’t name off random specific details about people off the top of my head, like you. I’m not honing in on your shtick.”

“Whatever.” Something else didn’t add up, though. “Wait, wait, wait. Wait. Wait. Ireland has a prince? I thought the Queen of England owned them.”

“The Queen of England doesn—what, Fry! The Queen doesn’t _own_ Ireland and its people, s-s-she doesn’t _own_ Britannia, she’s just its appointed ruler! And she’s not even the ruler anymore, she’s just a—just a figurehea—”

I waved my hand in Vanessa’s face to cut her off from her rant. “Spare me the history lecture, Plutarch, I know who the Queen of freaking England is. What I don’t know is how much I actually care. So there’s a rich new kid from Ireland who—wooh shit!” If I had been eating something, I would’ve spat it out in surprise and done a double-take. But since Friday Giza Colville is not a cartoon character, that didn’t happen, and all I ended up doing was slamming my drink on the concrete bench we’d been sitting on, causing some of it to spill on my hand and making a sticky mess. I had to lick it off. Gross. “ _Halloway_? Ni-Lo? Dude! No fucking way!”

Vanessa smirked at me. “ _Way_ fucking way.”

“No, no! I think my dad is that kid’s dad’s lawyer! He mentioned a big corporate contract with Niall-Logan over dinner last week— holy owl tits. Small world!” I looked back over to where I’d see the apparent heir to Ni-Lo sitting in the quad, but he wasn’t there. I frowned a bit, but shrugged it off. He was new, that explained it - he’d learn soon, if not from others than from observation, that I was a thing to be avoided, not stared at like a creeper—

“’Ello.”

My mind blanked out in shock for a bit, which is as embarrassing as it is unusual for me. I like to think that, despite how much I joke and am made fun of for having selective attention, I maintain a fairly level head. The last time I was surprised by something, it ended up almost getting my brother and I killed. Granted that not all surprises are bad; take Christmas presents, for example. However, coming from a family like mine, well, let’s just say that my family haven’t survived all this long by being easy to take by surprise. I will say this, however: Lorcan Allister Halloway is the first, and last boy to ever surprise me.

Vanessa was the first one to coherently respond. I was too busy gawking like a lunatic to form words. “Hi!” She chirped, like it was an everyday thing, for strange billionaire Irish kids to just mosey on over to our gloomy corner of social outcasts and chat us up. “Uh, heh, did you need something?” She asked, her voice breaking into a short, uneasy laugh. It was just odd. Vanessa never was unnerved by anything or anyone. When we were first becoming friends and I introduced her to Scott, she didn’t even bat an eye. She took Erik’s Vlad-ism in stride, she traded puns with my parents, and refused to be intimidated by my father’s reputation. It was one of the reasons I was so horribly fond of her - nothing ever fazed my Vanessa . . . Except, for some reason, the new kid did.

Maybe it was because Lorcan was tall, taller than me, which wasn’t so much rare as it was unlikely. I was five-foot-eleven, quite tall for a girl, and half a foot taller than Vanessa. I was eye-to-eye with Scott. I wasn’t used to being towered over - Lorcan was at least a whole head taller. He wasn’t bulky, nor was he particularly fit like some of the jock-types at school, but he definitely had a presence to him that immediately set off my weird-ar. I’m a magical dud, but I can still _feel_ magic in a certain way. When someone tries to cast a spell at or around me, I can feel the energy building up and being released like tingles on my scalp, that raises the hair on the back of my neck and gives me goosebumps. Lorcan Halloway physically felt like a minor blip on the weird-ar. Like a low tingle. Vanessa’s reaction made me question my own as part of my imagination. Maybe it was just the way the sunlight was striking him out there in the quad, or the way that he was standing up and I was sitting down so his shadow crossed mine, or maybe it was just that he had ridiculously blue eyes, and perfectly cut golden hair that was just the right amount of windswept; maybe it was the surprising strength in his jawline for someone our age, or his high, carved cheekbones—

And it occurred to me in a flash of inspiration that I was _actually checking him out._ I almost let out a gasp of shame at myself. That didn’t _happen_ to me. I didn’t check guys out, ever! Things like guys and girls and their inter-relationships didn’t matter to me. I was Friday _goddamn_ Colville. No! Just _no._

Halloway’s appearance was unnerving enough to me as it was, but the sudden realization that I was randomly attracted to him (at a _glance_ ) just made things worse. I didn’t know how to deal with that, since I’d never really had the opportunity to be attracted to anybody. I learned very early on into this ‘puberty’ business that I had a butterfly’s chance in space of a simple, doomed relationship like everyone else. (It helped that I wanted nothing to do with other people, anyway.) Maybe it was just because this Irish kid was actually speaking to me, or the creepy eye contact earlier . . . I didn’t know how to deal with it. So, I didn’t. I refused to process that train of thought, and opted for my base reaction to everything: rude suspicion.

While all this important, teenage stuff was going on in my head, Lorcan had turned to Vanessa with a small smile and a polite, extended hand. “I just wanted to introduce me’self,” he said politely, in response to her query. “Ya pro’ly already know who I am, but I go by Lee. Me full name’s a mouthful.”

Nessa visibly relaxed and shook his hand, looking pleased at the gesture, and I glared. “All right, Lee, hello. I’m Vanessa DuFrenne. My . . . Lady friend here,” she turned to indicate yours truly, frowning at the sight of my obvious glare, “well, _that’s_ a Fry. They’re indigenous to this region, and if you feed one accidentally it’ll never leave you alone.”

“A pleasure,” he greeted, all Irish brogue and smiles, either not getting Nessa’s joke or taking it in stride. Oh, boy, he was asking for it. Nobody’s goes all ‘polite’ on me! He was after something. He had to be. “Actually, I knew who ya were,” he admitted, looking at me. “You’re Friday Colville, yeah? Jammy to find ya here - our Da’s already know each other, pity we hadn’t met. S’pose it woulda happened soon. Living in Blackwood, going to the same school. Me folks have us moved into the new digs, but it’s gone how different roads and shite are on this side of the pond. S’a nice enough town, innit?”

I scowled at him with all my might. “Are you high? What’s wrong with you, kid?”

“Fry!” Vanessa scolded. She gave an apologetic expression to ‘Lee.’ “She was raised by wolves. Don’t mind her. The only social skills Fry ever learned were from animals.” ‘Wolves,’ I guess, was code-word for ‘a negligent vampire godfather.’

Lorcan didn’t look too offended, damn him. Instead, he looked very amused, but he was trying to hide it behind a smile. What the hell was his game here? Now he had me curious. Ah, augh. The last thing I needed in my life was to be _curious_ about an attractive, rich _boy!_ “It’s fair. I was a bit of a header back home.”

“I have no idea what that means,” I said bluntly, and took a drink from my soda.

His brow furrowed in thought. “Er, Americans. Right, it means I acted out a lot.”

“I don’t act out,” I told him, my tone as dead as pans could get, “I just don’t like you.”

“Raised by wolves,” Vanessa threw in, “she doesn’t mean that.”

“No, I meant it,” I insisted.

“No, she doesn’t.”

I turned my mismatched glare on Vanessa this time. How dare she turn on me! “Why are you trying to tell me what I mean and don’t mean? That’s just annoying. Why are you being annoying to me?”

“You’re annoying and naggy most of the time, but you don’t see me bitching about it, do you?” Nessa shot bac.

Lee was now eying the both of us like we were slightly crazy, but couldn’t decide if he was amused or put off by it. He appeared to be on the fence for a while, until he decided on amused, and let out a low chuckle. “Ran into a couple of quare hawks, I have.”

I switched my glare back to him, feeling my temper rising. “ _What_ did you just call her?”

“Oh, it’s a compliment,” he explained. “I didn’t intend offense.”

“Look, _Lee,_ ” I finally snapped, tired of all of this ‘talking’ and pretending to be social, “you haven’t been here long, so a word to the wise: I was raised by a bunch of black witches and killers.” That wasn’t a falsehood, I’d seen Dad kill a man in self-defense, and I knew for a fact Scott had killed simply because he was a vampire before they went public. “You’d better learn quickly how things work here or face the cold shoulders of pariah-dom. I’m warning you, because I’m trying to be nice. I’m actually doing you a favor right now - don’t talk to me, don’t look at me. Do yourself a favor and walk away, right now.”

Vanessa was about to object to my little speech, but one glare from me silenced her objections, and she just looked down instead. I didn’t like disappointing her, but it was the truth - the truth, and she couldn’t deny it. Being my friend had consequences. It didn’t hurt me to admit it, but I think sometimes it hurt her for whatever reason. I think she still has some lingering naivete, which part of me enjoys because it’s so different to what I’ve always known. I grew up in a very different world than Nessa did, which she sometimes allows herself to forget. It’s not a matter of forgetting for me - I can’t change who or what I am, and I envy no one. I dislike people immensely, but it’s not born out of a kind of sick envy where I wish I could just be like everyone else. Everyone else, when compared to my family, are horrid bores and ignorant pigs. But, I digress.

Lee, very suddenly, completely turned the situation up over my head and plopped his Irish arse right next to mine on the bench, grinning the kind of million-watt grin that should be illegal. I just stared, because what else is there to do but stare at someone when they’ve completely dumbfounded you?

All he said in response to me was this: “Everyone ken that. What do I care? And why should I listen to your advice, huh? You’re obviously a nutter, ya just said so yourself.”

I was still staring when Vanessa had the gall to laugh and say, “Dude’s got a point.”

And then Lee stared at her like she’d grown a second head. “What’s a ‘dude,’ anyway? I never knew.”

At that point, I couldn’t contain my hysterical giggles. Sometimes, you have to laugh just because there’s nothing else you can do.

As if with the flick of a wand, the Dynamic Duo that had previously consisted of only Vanessa and myself had now become a Trio. (The Terrible Trio? The Terrific Trio? The Galaxy Trio? Screw it, I’ll come up with a better name later.)

Lee wouldn’t leave us alone, and Nessa was more than happy to have another person to gab with, particularly as that person turned out to be as much of a history nerd as she was. I didn’t know how to feel about it, but it wasn’t something that I could avoid since Lee would _not_ leave me alone. I gradually got tired of being irritated at him, and settled for choosing not to feel anything at all about the subject. Lee, good-looking blond Irish bastard that he was, was a persistent little turd. Almost as persistent as me. I couldn’t help but respect that trait, even when I found it very annoying in others. Just take my little brother for example. The reason Erik and I had our spats was because we were both persistent bastards.

Still, there was something ‘off’ about Lee that I couldn’t put my finger on. Ever since he introduced himself to us that slow, lazy Wednesday, I’d been unable to peg what it was, but I’d gradually filed it away in the back of my mind for later study. Clearly, he wasn’t in his right mind, if he was willing to go out of his way to talk to the two of us. Maybe that was all that was off about him - that he possessed the desire to say ‘hell with it’ to social convention. I don’t know. Something in the back of my mind, some remaining suspicious part of me refused to let go of the idea that Lee was after something. He was playing a game, he had to be. I rationalized that my suspicions, if they weren’t proven right in time, would eventually die out; I had been abnormally on edge around Vanessa when we were first becoming friends, too. It was just basic psychology - anyone who was as isolated as I was would naturally be suspicious. Right? Right.

It didn’t help matters that right from the get-go, I’d had a little bit of a crush on Lee. I wasn’t an idiot - I knew what those feelings were, and I knew that they were utterly useless to me. I’d done my best to ignore them, but I was getting really annoyed at myself for blushing whenever he got _too_ close to me. I’d manage to contain my reaction to mere fidgeting. I couldn’t afford to let anyone know about it, least of all Vanessa - I somehow managed to hide the fact that I had a new friend, a _guy_ friend, from Scott for the first couple of weeks that the three of us had begun to hang out, but I didn’t know how long that was going to last.

I still couldn’t get over the idea that this rich Irish kid wanted anything to do with me. It just didn’t make sense. Just because my father was his father’s corporate attorney or whatever wasn’t reason enough; that was only a correlation, not causation. I knew that it wasn’t because Lorcan was interested in me - I mean, just _look_ at me. One black eye, one hazel, taller than most men, features to wide for her own face, and no chest to speak of? Seriously. And why would he just want to be my friend? I’m not a friendly person. I didn’t need any friends. Nessa was the only person I really interacted with outside of my family, and I was fine with that. I appreciated her a lot, and she was my best friend, but if I had never met her, I honestly don’t think I would have turned out very differently. There was no hole in me that experienced fulfillment in good company, or ached in the absence thereof; I got the same feeling from reading research material as I did having pleasant, casual conversation. (Except that people are capable of surprising me and research papers aren’t, which was why I usually preferred paper to people.) There’s an untold story named Candace behind that mentality. Needless to say, I learned the hard way growing up that getting _too_ close to people was something to be strictly avoided. Family was all that mattered, and anyone else just watered down the experience? So what was Lee playing at, pushing his way into my inner circle?

More importantly, could I afford to let him in?


	3. III

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Scott is sick (and will likely be the death of Marcus Colville), Lorcan has a dark secret, and nothing is ever simple.

Why does one park in a driveway? What’s the square root of two? What was the point of having a door if no one ever knocked on it? These are the questions in life that have no answers. All I can tell you for certain is that doors exist for a reason, and they are not intended to be ignored.

“Have you even _heard_ of knocking? What if I had been doing something!” I was indignant.

Scott accused me with his beady little red eyes, as if _I_ were the one being rude. Oh, how I wanted to poke out his eyes with a fork right then and roast them over an open fire. “You? _Doing_ something? Come on, let’s be honest. What do you really do with your time, Cheese Fry? What gloriously important project did I interrupt? Were you in the middle of solving the Hodge conjecture? Curing diabetes? You don’t do shit, and you know it!”

“I could have been masturbating— you don’t know!”

Scott’s face screwed up in disgust and he threw his head back. “Ahh! Sick! Sick, sick, sick!”

“And then you would have been scarred for the rest of your forsaken un-life! Try bleaching out that mental image! And knock next time, for the gods’ sake!”

“Sick! I’m sick! Ugh! Why?”

“Because you don’t knock, asshole. Learn to knock!”  
“Oh god! Why? I don’t even remember what I came up here for, all I can think about is _sick!_ Sick! Sick!”

“Good! Now, go away. I’m obviously busy.”

Scott was still muttering ‘sick, sick, sick, sick’ to himself like a mantra when he left my room, slamming the door shut behind him. Hopefully that would teach him.

I breathed a heavy sigh of relief, and flopped back on my bed, staring up at my burgundy canopy in thought as I absently ran my fingers over the embroidery of my coverlet. Scott didn’t need to know what I occupied my time with - no one did. It wasn’t their business. Scott was the person who was closest to me, so he was the only one I allowed to occasionally tromp over my privacy like that, but I still had my secrets. I didn’t need anyone to know what I did with my time, I didn’t want anyone to know, and that’s how it would always be.

When I could no longer hear my lanky, blood-drinking, pseudo-brother’s footsteps or chanting, I slid my arm underneath my pillow and yanked out the Bad Book, which had a small notebook of my own sticking out of its pages that I’d closed in the grimoire on in my haste to cover up what I was doing, when Scott had burst in without knocking. I enjoyed my privacy, and the fact that I had people who violated my privacy, burst into my room without knocking, and did other annoying things was a huge pet peeve of mine. Scott himself, in many ways, was a massive pet peeve of mine, most of the time. I wasn’t too worried, because the book was coded. I’d started inventing codes for it when I’d caught Erik, when I was much younger, going through my closet and giggling to himself. He hadn’t intended any harm, I recognize that now, but I was infuriated at the invasion and had blown it out of proportion. Erik didn’t pull things like that anymore. Scott, on the other hand, I didn’t have the power to stop. I could get as mad at him as I wanted, but he did what he pleased, and what pleased him most was annoying me. I annoyed him right back, so it was only fair and I deserved it, but _still._

I’d memorized Sandra’s Bad Book almost in its entirety, from front to back, but when I began taking notes on the book and studying dark magic further, it occurred to me that I might have had something in common with my great-grandmother. I was the only other female scion aside from Sandra born in the last six hundred years, and beyond that we were both compulsive about our note-taking, and occasionally used a code when we wrote. I could tell just from looking at Sandra’s meticulous, small hand-writing, with all the numerous footnotes and incomprehensible scrawls in the margins that she was just like me. I didn’t like it, but she was an obsessive, studious, evil genius, and it’s no question where I got my traits from.

Memorizing the grimoire helped only when I needed a quick-recall for one of Sandra’s one-line wonders. It didn’t help me decipher any hidden messages she was likely to have left - for that, I had to look for patterns. I looked to my own notes for clues, for mirrors in my own writings. I wasn’t hoping for much, but it kept my mind busy and it was sorta fun pretending to be a cryptographer. Over time, I’d translated the one-line wonders, most of the gruesome rituals and spells, and a veritable trove of ‘Commands’ meant to be used on the dead. None of them had ever helped me with Aunt Lil, so I assumed they were useless. The book wasn’t clear on the subject of the commands, though - it seemed to require something called Voice to speak, which the book was frustratingly vague on.

I was entertaining myself by re-reading a certain passage of Sandra’s grimoire, that I had summarized a few years ago from its original Latin. It described a binding spell, and a sacrifical act done at the apex of the spell - human or animal, the text is unclear. The purpose of the ritual seemed to be a blend of summoning and evocation, which ultimately is supposed to result in the creation of a “servant.” Out of context, I’m sure a reader would get the impression that Sandra wasn’t talking about ritual sacrifice to summon a horde of deathly daisies. I didn’t have the whole passage translated, just a portion of it. It was a clusterfuck of language and symbols, not intelligible at first glance, it was the only passage in the book I had left to eck out. I was still having some trouble with it. My theory was that the passage was Sandra’s how-to guide on how to make your own personal, intelligent, zombie army. Not only that, but after having poured over it the absurd amount of times that I had, I was almost positive that Sandra has actually succeeded in doing so at one point. Yet, I didn’t know enough about her illicit activities to confirm that assumption, so I had written a note that morning in my personal notebook about it for later research. To my knowledge, none of her other writings survived, so it was impossible for me to know for certain what she did or didn’t do.

I briefly obsessed over the implication that my serial killer great-grandmother had left a massive army of the reanimated dead hidden somewhere in the world, doing gods knew what right at that moment, and that I was the only one who knew about it. I didn’t even know what I’d do with such an army, because the summoning and binding of spirits was highly illegal, as was the creation of the undead. (The news was always peppered with stories of ghouls popping up here and there; they’re typically no-mystery cases of dead people haunting their bodies because they can’t ‘move on.’ Poltergeists are what happen to spirits who haunt a place and not a body, but still can’t move on, like Aunt Lil. We’ve tried talking her into the light before, with no success. How hard can it fucking be to walk toward a goddamn light?) Scott always claims vampires aren’t ‘undead,’ even though they technically are, because of a law passed seventy years ago by the GOU that absolved them in mitius, granting them the right to citizenship, which could be annulled if they went a-drainin’ like some of them did in the old days. (Non consensi exsanguis, I think, is the legal term for that). Speaking of vampires… _How would I ever explain this to Scott? Good question, me! Hello, yes, I know this looks like the zombie apocalypse, but it’s cool. This army is with me. Oh, and I know black magic. That’s how I got these zombies, see? Sandra left a book in the attic that I found when I was exploring. When I was eleven. Please don’t give me that look._

The point was moot, at least until I deciphered the whole passage. I had all the time in the world to do that.

Before leaving my room, still with a stupid giddy grin on my face, I secured Sandra’s grimoire in its safe place. “Fieri tenebra _,_ ” I whispered to the silence of the room, and watched as the lights on the wall turned themselves off in perfect unison. With an even bigger grin, I closed my door and walked out, ready to face what the world had in store for me that day.

It didn’t even register that Scott had burst into my room for a reason. I’d been too distracted. Well, of course he usually had a reason - it just was probably a stupid reason. That was my logic. Scott did annoying things to me all the time. I had gotten so used to him annoying me and doing dumb things that it didn’t even occur to me until way after the fact, that maybe there had been a legitimate reason for him to bother me. If I didn’t ever listen to a damn thing Scott said to me, it was because he never had anything important to say. Sometimes he would text me complete nonsense by accident. Who does that? He didn’t get to complain when the first and only time he ever had something actually important to tell me, I didn’t listen. This was what I tried to explain to him when he accosted me at the foot of the stairs, and began to badger me about shelves and dining sets. Or that’s at least what it _sounded_ like he was badgering me about; I was only paying him half of my attention.

“My dear, Godfather Scotty,” I said with a saccharine smile, batting my eye lashes. “Have you ever heard the tale of ‘The Boy Who Cried Wolf?’”

Scott stopped in his rampant pacing and placed himself right in front of, leveling me with a red glare. “Don’t be a nit. And don’t get cute with me! You’re only ugly when you’re cute, you know.”

I straightened my spine, crossed my arms, and did my best to look ‘confident’ in spite of the insult. “What’s all the fuss for?”

“Well I was _going_ to tell you about it,” he sneered, “but then you filled my fragile mind with such vile, disturbing images, and it traumatized me so deeply that I can’t think of it now. Now, all I can think about is sick, sick, sick, sick, sick!”

“You mean, you forgot.”

“I was traumatized, you sick fiend! You traumatized me!”

“I traumatized nothing!” I roared, throwing my hands up in the air. “You forgot! Why do I even talk to you?”

“Why are you asking me?” He roared. “You’re the one who’s SICK in the head!”

“So, this is my warm welcome home?” a voice from behind the two of us bickering idiots intoned with a deep chuckle, causing me to shriek in surprise. Scott cocked an eyebrow at my girlish antics. I glared, slapped him on the arm, and slowly turned around to face the owner of that deep voice: my tall, agate-eyed, shiny-headed father, Marcus Colville, dressed to the nines in a three piece suit, with a black briefcase on the ground beside him. Dad had been gone for half the week. He’d flown to the branch of his law firm in Los Angeles, then spent the last day working at his office here in town. If everything went well and according to plan, he would have had just now gotten home from work after a long day of flights and paperwork. Anyone else would have suffered extreme jet lag; Daddy looked clean and crisp as ever. Nothing ruffled the feathers of Marcus Stelian Colville.

“Uh. Hello, Daddy,” I said, attempting not to sound nervous (and failing miserably, I’m sure). It’s not that my dad was intimidating. Well, he was actually an intimidating man, but not to me - to other people. To me, he was Daddy. A Dad that I actually hadn’t seen in a long while, because he’d been so busy at work and I’d been so “busy” at school (and hanging out with Vanessa and Lee) that we just hadn’t really encountered one another. That was normal, for me. Scott was usually around, so I didn’t get lonely. Dad was a little more present when I was younger, but ever since I became a teenager, he left me to my own devices. I know that he tries to make time for us, especially for Erik. I don’t judge or resent him. Sometimes I resented Mom a little bit, because I saw her even less than my father. She’s always away, or out of town, or something. It’s always _something._ Mother’s always busy with her projects and charities.

“Is arguing all you two ever do?” He asked us, his green eyes roving amusedly between Scott and I. Scott appeared totally unrepentant, and stared at me expectantly. I had enough decency to look a little ashamed.

“No, Dad,” I blurted, suddenly feeling defensive, “but he started it! He just barged into my room like a psycho nit, and then yelled at me when I told him off!”

Scott rolled his eyes. “Tattle-tell.”

“Mature response,” I teased. Just how old was he? Sometimes I forgot that he was Turned™ when he was twenty.

Dad chuckled, and I smiled unabashed. Nothing Scott or I ever did was really sincere. We fought all the time, and constantly told on each other. Dad was used to our incessant antics, having been at the receiving end of them for many, many years. I like to imagine that when he and Scott were in college together, they used to cut up and act out just like Scott and I now did, but I find it difficult to imagine my father ever letting down his hair. Er, so to speak. Dad’s bald. He started balding when I was thirteen, and shaved it all off immediately because he didn’t want to deal with it. He looks better bald, in my opinion, than he ever did with hair. Or maybe I’ve just grown accustomed to it.

Dad’s expression was hard to read at that moment. He looked tired, but amused at the same time. “Alright, I think that’s enough stupidity for one afternoon.”

“Sir, yes sir,” Scott barked with a salute, then vamp-sped out of the room.

Dad sighed, and I could swear I heard him mutter under his breath ‘little vamp shit.’ I refused to believe that was what I really heard. My father didn’t say things like that. It just wasn’t done. He looked at me and prophesied, quite seriously, “That man will be the death of me.”

I felt a smile come across my face against my will. “Start hanging garlic over your bed?”

“I doubt that would deter a determined vampire,” he said dubiously. “I see you’re in good form today. How has school been?”

I reported to Dad that I was excelling in all my classes, per usual, and so was Erik, according to his last report cards. I was the one who saw Erik the most, so Dad and Mom, whenever they came home from a long period away, would typically come to me and ask for a status update on the goings-on of us children. It was routine. As always, Erik and I did well in school, and as always, Father (or Mother) would give us a pat on the back. It wasn’t as fun as when we were little; I used to get rewarded for every test I aced. Then one day, after I’d aced several of my advanced placements when I was nine, the ice cream that Mom brought home for yours truly ended up being poisoned (not just food poisoning, someone literally put cyanide into the chocolate sprinkles), I woke up in the emergency room, and I haven’t been near the stuff since. I miss ice cream.

Dad nodded in response to my report on mine and my brother’s academics, and said, “Good to hear. Have there been any incidents worth noting?”

He was referring to incidents with Erik and Vlad, of which I told him there had been none that I knew of. I left out the one that had happened when Vlad had flipped out over the batteries in the TV remote for no reason and called me a witch. What Dad didn’t know wouldn’t furrow his brow none; the less Dad’s brow was furrowed, the less of a glaring disappointment I felt I looked like.

I followed him to his home office and and watched as he started transferring paperwork from his briefcase to the walnut credenza. “Yes, Friday?” He inquired over his shoulder without looking at me or pausing in his work. “Was there something else?” Yes, there was something else. Lots of somethings-elses, but only one something-else that my Dad needed to know.

“I met Lorcan Halloway in school,” I told him, “and he befriended Vanessa and I. We befriended him, I mean. I mean, there was befrien—we, we’re friends now. He’s an interesting character, the three of us have been getting along amicably. I thought that you would want to know, and I’m fully prepared to relinquish any association with him, if it is a problem for us.” The last thing the family needed were complications of the legal sort. Though I honestly couldn’t imagine how my association with Lee would complicate anything, family-wise.

Father was quiet for a moment, devoting his attention to assorting paperwork. When he finished, he sat down in his black leather chair and loosely laced his fingers together in a contemplative gesture. I’d seen him perform this gesture a hundred-thousand times. It was as much his signature as the chair he was sitting in. “The Halloways are Blackwood’s most recent additions, but they aren’t my firm’s client,” he finally said. “The Niall-Logan Corporation is our client. Our firm primarily interacts with the American counterparts of Niall-Logan’s board of directors. Lorcan’s father, Declan, appears to supervise the board from time to time. I’ve met his father all of twice. He’s asked me for a private consultation, but currently, I don’t see how your association with this boy could be an issue, unless there’s something else I need to know?” My Dad gauged me carefully while I held as still as a stump. If a stump had hair. And one black eye, one gray-green. And could breathe. Dammit, I needed to _concentrate_ , I was putting too much thought into stumps, and they weren’t even relevant—

Then again, maybe I should tell my father some things. Maybe I should tell him about the weird vibes Vanessa and I both got off of Lee when we met him. Maybe I should tell him that there seemed to more to him th—

“No, Daddy.”

“Perhaps you ought to bring him by and introduce him to your mother and I.” _Whenever you and mother are both home,_ I wanted to say, but I held my tongue. “I always enjoy meeting your friends.” By which he meant, ‘I enjoy testing your friends to see if they’re worth your time.’ I knew that, by his saying this, it meant I would _have_ to bring Lee by for inspection soon. I didn’t argue with it, it was perfectly fair - I didn’t want an issue like Candace to happen again, though I doubted that Lee would stoop to such things considering who his family was. He had far more to lose, and less to gain by befriending me. If he passed Marcus Colville’s inspection, there might be hope . . .

I stood and straightened the hem of my shirt. “Well, he’s a character, that’s for sure. Very Irish, blond, and tall. He has a whole two rows of white teeth, and, uh, two normal looking feet. I’ve heard him say ‘craic’ and I didn’t know what it meant, still don’t know.” I shrugged. “I, uh, initially thought he was talking about drugs. But he said he wasn’t.” I was rambling. I had to stop myself before more crap spilled out of my mouth.

Dad smiled. I frowned. The phrase ‘red flag’ flew through my mind.

Rarely have I seen my parents together in the last two years, as they have been consistently busy fighting court battles and settling business deals. Mom had been in Reykjavik for most of the last month, funding Doctor Bjørnagun Kristiun’s latest biologically engineered work of art. The doctor’s work was important and he was a close friend of the family, ever since his prototype cure to lycanthropism famously saved Mom from a werewolf bite. The story was a hit in the news a few years ago because it basically marketed itself - wealthy woman of an infamous Old-Money family gets bitten by rabid werewolf, a doctor suffering from genetic lycanthropism offers his prototype miracle cure out of the goodness of his heart, she funds his research in gratitude, reputation win. Still, I resented the Icelandic werewolf a bit for keeping my mother from her family obligations. It didn’t seem to faze Dad at all (though I knew they loved each other), but I sometimes wondered how he dealt with it.

Mom arrived late in the evening four days after my Dad did, with a severe case of jet lag. In the interim, I kept away from the temptation of studying the Bad Book further, even though I felt like its mysteries were taunting me. I was preoccupied, busily stewing over my newfound fascination with Lee’s eyes, his hair, his profile, his smile, the way his expression would dramatically change when he thought I wasn’t looking . . .

I wanted to believe that Lorcan underestimated my skills of observation. I could be a very sneaky snoop, when I wanted to be. I wanted to believe he didn’t catch me staring, or hanging off of his words, or getting lost in the charming lilt of his accent. I wanted to believe that, because I needed to believe that the feelings and opinions of others didn’t matter to me. He did catch me, though - and there were a few instances where we both knew without speaking what was really going on. I would always look away, or down, or brush it off, but he _knew._ What was most maddening was the little knowing smirk he gave me, that little upturn of the corner of his lips that spoke volumes. He knew what I was doing, even if I didn’t know it; he knew what I was thinking, when I didn’t realize it; he knew, because somehow, impossibly, Lorcan Halloway was smarter than me.

That was a blow to my ego, I won’t lie. I wasn’t the best or greatest human being around - I was arrogant and conceited, and sometimes I would lord it over the peons around me for my own amusement. I was like the bastard kid who fried ants in the sun with a microscope to see if it really worked. I somehow always managed to justify my behavior to myself by admitting it openly, and making no apologies whatsoever whenever the subject came up, which I liked to think made me better than the average jerk. In reality, I’m not sure if the distinction matters. A self-aware jackass remains one. Around Lee, there were disturbing moments where I would feel like the ant under his eye, only unlike the ants I used to mindlessly burn out of boredom, I knew what was going on, and there was nothing I could do about it but squirm.

Despite my stupid girl-feelings on the matter, I did find myself actually liking Lee’s company. He was pleasant to be around, and Vanessa got along with him well enough after she got used to his presence. There was still something about him that unsettled me that I couldn’t put my finger on, though. I knew that whenever I talked to him, this weird feeling in my gut would surface. I hadn’t yet found a way to describe the feeling. It was uncomfortable, but not. It made me jittery. I didn’t like it at all, even though Lee, Nessa and I all got along just fine as friends.

On the day my mother arrived back in town I got my first clue. My first hint. The first legitimate evidence that my paranoia wasn’t paranoia, that I wasn’t totally insane, or just a girl with a crush. I knew instinctively that something had to be ‘up’ with Lorcan Halloway. Nothing in my life, and no one in it, could ever be simple. It’s like, a law somewhere. I’m sure of it.

Since Lee had made our duo into a trio, the fascination in our school with the new rich Irish heir had gone down considerably. It wasn’t surprising. Anyone who hung around me was clearly a nut job to be avoided. The three of us would cut it up in between classes and during lunches, talking about everything and nothing, trading witticisms . . . It passed the time. Vanessa would usually dominate the topics and Lee and I would follow along, content to bask in the chatter. Though, in-between our idle conversations, usually when Nessa was going off on some unbelievable thing she’d heard on the Internet or a fascinating historical fact she’d read about, I would stare. I would stare at our surroundings, at Vanessa, at the sky, at my fingernails, but mostly I would stare at Lee.

I never said I wasn’t a creep.

That day, when what was really going on dawned on me, Lee caught me staring. Nessa wasn’t there, so it was just the two of us - she’d gone inside to pee, and left me all alone with this dangerously pretty Irish boy. I felt betrayed, and then he caught me staring, and my heart fell into my shoes because he caught me. He caught me, and for once I didn’t look away - a stubborn part of me that I’d never felt before caught his blue, blue eyes and met them with my own dichotomous pair. His gaze was such that I felt for a frightening few seconds that he could stare into my soul, and my breath caught in my chest. I suddenly couldn’t breathe or look away, and I was trapped in his stupidly intense eyes.

Under his stare, I felt like the ground had been ripped away; my stomach did a series of flips that made my head spin, and I experienced the queer sensation of free-fall while I was standing still. In my mind’s eye, there was an image of a pit of darkness, opening up under my feet and swallowing me whole.

A few breathless seconds passed before I was finally able to breathe normally and look away, but it was not by my own volition. What I mean is, Lee had somehow held me in that too-long moment, and I was only able to look away when he _released_ me. I watched him smirk the sort of smirk that should be illegal when it happened. It wasn’t my imagination. It was evil, I knew it was, I felt it in my bones. He smirked evilly at me, at the hold he had over me, and it hit me with a cold rush of adrenaline that he was enjoying this. He was watching me squirm, and it made him happy. I felt sick and hyper at the same time. When we broke eye contact, goosebumps raised on my arms.

Now, I know the difference between reality and delusion. So that’s why I was pretty scared by this unreal moment, and spent the rest of the day debating whether or not I was an insane, paranoid idiot, all because just before Lee allowed me to break eye contact, I had heard a voice in my head, deep and full of something I couldn’t name. It was a voice that was wasn’t a voice, not a real sound but an uncontrolled thought that spliced into my consciousness with stunning ferocity. It felt cold and strange, like snakes slithering through my brain. It said, ’ _I HAVE YOU._ ’

It had to have stemmed from Lee, nothing else made sense - it happened to me just as he smirked, and when he finally looked away, I heard the sound of my own heart beating like a war drum in my ears.

_I HAVE YOU._

I saw it, I heard it, I _knew_ , and Lee knew too - he was playing with me, toying with me, and he wanted me to know. He wanted me to play ball with him. For some reason, that notion filled me with terror. I felt like my insides had tied themselves into a knot that lodged itself my chest. I kept quiet for the rest of the day and didn’t make eye contact with anyone. Vanessa asked me once what was wrong, and I told her it was a headache. She frowned. I didn’t care.

At the end of that day, I realized some things. One was that I was really messed up, but that wasn’t exactly news. Another was that I had a serious issue with being unable to walk away - when something catches my interest, there is no force alive that can divert my attention. Lee had managed to snatch my attention like nothing since Sandra’s black magic book did, and he knew it. He knew what he had done, and it wasn’t unwitting - he was doing it on purpose, and he wanted me to know he was doing it on purpose. He was pulling me in, fascinating me, distracting me. Not only did I have a stupid, girly crush on him, but I was _fascinated_ with the mystery he had presented me with. It was like a mind game. He had something that I didn’t know about, that no one else knew about except for me, and the only reason I knew was because I had a very one of my own. Behind his pretty eyes, lyrical accent, and white smile, Lorcan Allister Halloway had a dark secret.


	4. IV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Friday becomes a tour guide, a mysterious school project is abandoned, and the plot happens.

I stared at the den’s unlit fireplace when I got home, and I didn’t think about the incident until Scott rose. I wrote about it in my journal before I went to bed that night, after Mom’s late arrival. From that day forward, I determined I would avoid eye contact with Lorcan and kept my feelings suppressed as much as possible. Which was difficult, because he didn’t give me any more clues after that. Vanessa and I rarely had any time alone - not that it was a problem - so I couldn’t discuss my concerns with her. It wasn’t the sort of thing you’d text somebody about. I considered asking my parents, but I honestly wasn’t one-hundred-percent sure that it hadn’t been a hallucination. Either I was crazy, or Lorcan was something I couldn’t figure out.

Avoiding him was impossible, so I sucked it up and pretended like nothing was wrong, for about a week. Then, I made the stupid mistake of allowing him to pick me up so we could do a study-session at Vanessa’s house, to knock out a group project for our history class. I hadn’t even thought about it when I said yes, and the next thing I knew, I was wasting a Saturday morning picking out clothes to wear. I felt ridiculous after I realized that I had changed my outfit four times that morning before getting fed up and throwing a simple dress on and saying ‘fuck it.’ It had never occurred to me, for a second, not _once_ in my entire time on this wretched earth, that I could become the kind of person who spends hours getting dressed because they’re worried about a boy. It was even more messed up when I remembered that I had good reason to be anxious around this particular boy.

I tried to mentally psych myself up for the weird day I knew, on some level, I was doomed to have, by staring at the graveyard outside my window. While I waited for Lorcan to tell me he was on his way, I dealt with my anxiety by going through the names of my favorite dead ancestors. One of them, Annelise, was responsible for the wonky weather outside. Blackwood was perpetually overcast. There are legends that say it’s cursed, but most people think it’s because of the way wind travels through the valley we’re in. Truth of the matter was, the overcast sky was centered around our home - Blackwood just suffered the consequences by being a little more green and gloomier than any other part of happy little Connecticut. Annelise had pissed off the head of an English coven by sleeping with her husband. The curse said that she’d, ‘never have the sun shine on her line,’ or something stupid and ill-phrased like that. Basically, as long as people of our blood stayed in the house (so always), the sun’s rays wouldn’t be able to touch the ground (except when we went on vacation, I guess). True to Colville form, my ancestors decided not to bother with lifting the curse since the ‘consequences’ were mild, and they felt like it suited them. Scott benefited the most, I think, since it was sometimes dark enough during the day that he could go outside without getting singed, which was useful during the Great Gnome Hunt.

I eventually received word that Lorcan was en route, and promptly forgot about all that calm. I also freaked out about my hair, and changed my outfit again.

When Lee arrived, I ran out to the balcony to try and get to the door before someone else did. All I wanted to do was say hello, and leave. I hadn’t told anyone that he was picking me up, and I didn’t want any of them to meet him yet. It was too strange, and I didn’t know enough about Lorcan, and then there was the hallucination thing to worry about. Him meeting my family was sure to give me a headache, or anxiety attack, or probably both. With Mom and Dad still asleep, as far as I knew, and Scott was screaming through the screen of an FPS game when I’d checked on him at six that morning. Erik was the only odd factor. Erik, the turd in chief, my arch-nemesis in the Cereal Wars . . .

I never intended to bring Lee over at all. I was just going to invite him over, allow him a glimpse inside, and then take off with him to Vanessa’s place to work on our stupid project. Maybe. Or a church, or a car dealership, I didn’t know or care. Erik ruined that plan by answering the door when Lorcan called, and to my horror, they introduced themselves to one another and started _talking_. I witnessed the whole crime from my position on the main balcony. I was about to run downstairs and interrupt, but my tongue tied itself into knots when Erik smiled at me. There wasn’t a trace of Vlad in his eyes or smile, it was just my charming little brother being his own little self, introducing himself to my friends. I admit that sometimes, I felt bad that I didn’t include Erik in my business, but then again what was my business was _mine_ and no one else’s. Besides, Erik needed to have his own life one day. He wouldn’t achieve that by sharing my life, right? As an older sister, it was my duty to tease him and treat him like dirt . . . Provided I never took it too far and made sure he knew that while I did think he was a pest, I did still love him. He was _my_ sworn pest to bear, after all.

Somehow, Erik had tricked me into giving Lorcan a proper tour of the grounds. Lee, to my chagrin, was Irish-ly delighted at the idea. Erik insisted on tagging along, since he seemed to like Lee - then again, Erik liked just about everybody when he wasn’t being Vlad. Vlad didn’t like anybody on principle - the principle of Vlad being a bitter, dead, Slavic prince with nothing left to conquer and no one left to kill. Erik was a friendly brat, but something about the way he had instantly warmed up to Lee made me nervous. I liked Lee, but I wasn’t keen on my family getting to know him. The idea of he and my Dad sitting across from each other at a dinner table together gave me the jitters. No, that wasn’t because I was attracted to him. Shut up.

Anyway, I couldn’t ruin his stupid grin, so I clammed up and meandered down the stairs while Erik suggested to me from the landing that he and I show Lee around the Colville estate. My little brother must have also rendered me temporarily insane, because I numbly said, ‘okay.’ Next thing I knew, I was playing tour guide with Erik trailing behind me, offering half-whispered commentary and criticisms to a very (and kinda infuriatingly, on my part) bemused Lorcan Halloway.

“The original manor was burnt to a crisp with not a thing left standing in 1863. It was already over a hundred years old by then, so maybe it was for the best, because the rebuilt manor around us is more spacious and has fire-retardant insulation. The furniture is all antique, although very little of it is original, as most everything was destroyed in the fire - still, it was recreated in its former image nearly exactly. There have been modifications and add-ons over the years, like the conservatory, the garage, the basement, the wine cellar, the air conditioning . . . We keep a separate storehouse for chopping up our murder victims a little further off the property, near the graveyard, which I’ll show you later. Anyway, after the place was burnt by a normie mob, it was rebuilt more or less into the current incarnation of the Colville Manor you see now. The only thing left of the old estate, aside from the graveyard, is Aunt Lilith, our some-odd great aunt who haunts the west attic. She’s normally pretty quiet and hates leaving her place of death, so you probably won’t see her around.”

“Oooh!” Erik exclaimed, his eyes going wide and round. “We should visit her, Fry! Lee, do you want to meet our Aunt Lil? She’s funny.”

“Funny?” I objected, before Lee could open his mouth. “Erik, are you on drugs? She’s an _ass_ hole. We should’ve had her exorcised years ago.”

“Fry!” Erik was butt-hurt. “Don’t say that, she’s family, and we shouldn’t ever speak unkindly of family.”

“She’s _dead_ and won’t move on! She’s annoying,” I insisted.

Erik stuck out his pouty lip. “It’s not her fault she died up there and can’t move on. You just don’t like her because she doesn’t like you!”  
  
I threw up my arms in the air. “Thank you, Erik, for outlining why I don’t like her. She doesn’t like me, in fact _hates_ my guts, and has never bothered to explain why. All she does is throw ectoplasm at innocent, confused children.” I folded my arms and glared, then blushed when I realized Lorcan was staring at me with a bemused expression.

“She never threw ectoplasm at me,” Erik defended. “Maybe you remind her of someone in her life that she can’t forget. I sometimes get that - with the triggers, you know. I’m sure there’s a good reason for it.” Why he was defending Aunt Lil, I cannot explain. It literally made no sense to me. What was up his butt?

“What’s up your butt, Erik?” I asked, genuinely curious. “You don’t even like her. _I_ don’t like her. Why do you care?” He was about to say something, but I cut him off. “You know what? Nevermind, it doesn’t matter. I just decided, _I_ don’t care. Screw Aunt Lil, and I hope she didn’t hear me say that. You made me the captain of this ship, and I’m steering this cruise outside. You don’t like it, find another tour guide. Now, to the main floor!”

“Ye’re a classy guide,” Lee teased. “It’s a nice gaff, but I’ve heard better yarns from my Da when e’s plastered.” Lee looks down at Erik. “Have you any better tour guides? I think ours is defective.”

“Laugh it up,” I told him, darkly, as I marched the three of us down the main stairs. “You probably thought I was joking about the storehouse, but you’ll see. They’ll all see . . .”

“What’s a gaff?” I heard Erik ask, and rolled my eyes.

Lee apologized and explained that he had been giving our home a compliment. That was rare - the last time someone had complimented our house was when Vanessa had first seen it. It wasn’t that the manor was unkempt or anything, but the decor wasn’t people-friendly. As far as I knew, the actual decor hadn’t changed outside of the habited rooms since Sandra Colville was alive. Generally, our people like their decorations to reflect their personalities . . . So Mom, who had modernized and re-designed the entire kitchen and Conservatory, favored earthy colors and patterns balanced on neutral backgrounds and was a fan of sunlight, judging by all the massive windows she’d installed. Everything else was at the dark and deep end of the color spectrum, with very little variation. The formal dining room had tall, thick velvet curtains the color of dried blood that edged its floor-to-ceiling windows, and spare inch of wall that didn’t have a mural painted on it was covered in dark-patterened, Victorian-style wallpaper. It’s a family thing. We like people to know who they’re dealing with right when they walk in. Vanessa called it, “elegant but freaky,” and explained that it felt like she had walked into a haunted house when she’d first come in. Nessa’s sensitive. She wasn’t at all surprised when I told her it actually was haunted. (Probably by more than just Aunt Lil, too. Wouldn’t surprise me if there were some other things lurking around. Would explain a lot. Like how most normies - hell, most people in general can’t set foot on the property without primal instinct, buried in their gut and manifested as cold terror screaming at them to run away. I’m quoting a guy on that, which is sad. The great thing about being me is that I don’t even need to be dramatic - my life is indefensibly insane.) Anyway, my point was, Lee was the second person I’d ever heard of giving our home a compliment, which boded well for our future friendship, but badly for my future feelings. Stupid Irish nit. With his words and eyes and his… stupid hair! Everything was stupid, everywhere.

I grumpily led our group out onto the grounds via the back exit from the Conservatory, pausing to let him take in the greenhouse’ air, and started the history lesson again just as Lee was getting flustered trying to explain to my nine year old brother what being ‘plastered’ meant. Erik probably thought that Lee meant that his Dad literally painted himself with plaster. I sighed when I overhead that. Sometimes I worry about that little boy. What are they even teaching him in that private school? You’d think Scott would teach him about something real once and a while. Then again, Scott had never been as close with Erik as he was with me.

“And this is where we keep our dead people,” I announced and gestured out at the grounds. Lee’s eyes widened as he took it in.

Our family graveyard is situated on a slight downhill, but extends out farther than you think it would. It’s ancestral land, for us, although technically speaking the Natives were on it before our ancestors first came here after their exile from England. That’s how everything is in New England, though - the Western world was founded on the backs of dead Natives. It’s technically a protected cemetery in its own right, with its own gates and everything. We let most of the plants out there grow wild - back in the really old days, pagans used to just plant trees over people’s graves instead of stones, which resulted in us having a small forest of yew and hawthorn growing wild in our backyard, because most of my ancestors were big black magic drama queens. “Every person who has ever born the name Colville, with two exceptions, is buried here,” I explained. Lee slowly walked past me and towards the standing stones, which forced Erik and I to follow.

“I thought ya were joking,” Lee commented in a soft voice, “didn’t think ye’d have true . . . Pretty morbid, innit? Havin’ this for a backyard? Havin’ to look out at this every day?”

“I can see it from my bedroom balcony,” I told him cheerily. “Whenever I wake up, I look out at this cemetery and am reminded of the meaninglessness of our existences. It brings me joy.” Lee gave me a weird look that I delighted in. The moment was ruined when a fallen leaf, carried on the breeze, smacked me in the face.

“She just likes looking at the forest,” Erik explained, further ruining it for me. “She hates flowers, but likes trees. She used to climb the ones back here all the time. I used to too, but I got in trouble with Mom because I fell and got hurt a lot, so she made me stop.” I messed up Erik’s hair in retaliation, getting him all flustered.

“Anyway,” I went on, speaking over my little brother’s mumbled frustration, “the bigger stones and statues you see looming over some of the graves mark the resting places for the most accomplished of our family line. That creepy crying winged one over there,” I pointed, “whom I _hate_ , is standing on top of my great-great-great grandfather Grayson. His only two notable accomplishments in life, other than being firstborn, were re-building the house after it burnt down for the second time, and contracting syphilis from a French prostitute. He died drooling, noseless, and mad as a hatter, staring out of a window at this same cemetery. In the guest room neighboring mine, I might add - and yet you don’t see him haunting the guest room, do you, Erik? Right, no, you _don’t_ , because some spirits aren’t total idiots who can’t figure out how to move the hell on.” Erik stuck his tongue out at me for this. I rolled my eyes. “Anyway, whatever, so Grayson, by family logic, warranted an ostentatious angelic statue to squat over his rotting corpse in the ground. As you can see, my family has a rich and storied history—”

“Who isn’t here?” Lee asked, randomly.

I blinked. “What?”

“Ya said all but two were buried here,” he clarified.

“Right, I said . . . that.” I remembered. “Uh, some-odd-great Aunt Lilith. She doesn’t have a grave out here, since her body was nothing but ash, so there weren’t any remains left to bury. The second was my great-grandmother, Sandra. She wasn’t buried here either, since her body was also burned. Though in her case, less of an accident.”

“That makes sense,” Lee nodded, and to his credit he didn’t mention anything about the serial killer thing. He seemed to take everything in stride like that. He kept surprising me. I didn’t like it, but I did at the same time. Why couldn’t I ever sort out my feelings about this guy?

On our way back inside, Lee stopped. “Wait,” he said. “She likes to bi—ya main ya actually got yer Great Aunt hauntin’ yer house?! I thought ya two were jokin’! Why would ya _want_ to live in haunted house?”

Erik smiled. “Oh no, she’s not bad, she just lives in the attic, where she died,” Erik supplied happily, which saved me the trouble of explaining what I defined as a ‘joke.’ “She doesn’t come out much. I think she likes it up there. Also she stopped a burglar once!”

“It isn’t that she likes it up there, Erik, she’s just stuck there,” I explained to my little brother. “Who wants to stick around the place they died forever? She can’t leave, you dweeb.”

“Yes she can,” he insisted, “and I know cuz I’ve seen her in the hall before!” He was pulling that wide-eyed, know-it-all expression that only kids are capable of - you know the face that tells you they know everything. You know as soon as a kid pulls that certain look, they’re prepared to argue their stupid point until the grass dies.

I swept my mass of braids over one shoulder for dramatic effect. “You’re full of it,” I announced, and flounced back inside, ending the tour before he could give me any more lip.

Using my older sister powers, I was able to extort Erik into doing his homework and leaving Lee and I alone for a while. Lee’s visit, and the subsequent tour, had been entirely impromptu and I wasn’t sure where to go from there. Since we lived in the same neighborhood, it made sense on the surface, for us to carpool, but I think Lee was using it as an excuse to see inside my ancestral home. He’d been a little too enthusiastic when meeting Erik and suggesting the tour. I was just glad that Scott was downstairs for the count - I didn’t want to deal with that. Dealing with my little brother was bad enough. I didn’t want to overwhelm the guy with everything at once, like I had with Vanessa. She and I were okay now, but we had a rough start.

“I’m super sorry about that,” I tried to apologize, but couldn’t really bother to actually sound apologetic. “Erik can be—”

Lee cut me off with a dismissive noise. “S’no trouble at all. Erik seems a dacent kid.”

“Yaaa-ou’re only saying that because you haven’t seen his alter ego.”

Lorcan laughed at that. I guess he hadn’t heard about my brother’s noggin-problem. I debated whether or not to tell him about Vlad, but decided against it. Partially because Erik’s situation is too complicated for me to bother untangling slowly, but also because if Lee stuck around for a while, there was a good chance down the road that he’d meet Vlad face-to-face, and it would be really funny to watch the boy’s reaction if he hadn’t been in on the joke. Then Lee’d hearken back to this conversation, slap himself for thinking I was being sarcastic, and oh, what a good chortle I would have at his expense.

After this stirring conversation, we ended up standing in the mud room in total silence. I would say it was awkward, but I’m not sure I’m qualified to judge what awkwardness feels like. I’ll be engaged in a perfectly comfortable silence with a person after saying something, and then they’ll call it ‘awkward’ out of nowhere. I know that Lee and I stood there for a while he looked at me, and I looked at everything that wasn’t him. I started feeling too warm, so I think I just mumbled something and began to pick at the hems of my long sleeves. Why was I wearing a sweater? I hated sweaters. They’re so itchy and warm, and it wasn’t even winter yet. It was actually balmy that day. Why had I worn it? I couldn’t remember. Sure, fall was arriving and the rust color off-set my one nice eye—

“So, ya hate flowers, do ya?” Lee’s voice startled me out of my inner sweater-tirade.

He was staring at me, expectantly. Or curious. I don’t know. I scratched at my wrists under my sleeves and struggled to hold his gaze. Most people thought I was rude for not making eye contact, which I ran with, because what do I care what people think? Except… I didn’t want Lorcan to think I was rude. His judgment mattered, and I was locked in an argument with myself over why. “Flowers,” I repeated. “Yeah, I guess they’re not my cup of tea.”

He shook his head in disbelief, but his tone was amused. “What sorta girl don like pretty flowers?”

I shrugged and broke our eye contact, feeling relieved the second I did. That’s how bad I was. “Disliking flowers has nothing to do with my anatomical gender.”

“Ye’re about the least girly girl I’ve ever met,” Lee threw in, and even though I knew he was teasing, it kinda stung a little, and I wasn’t sure why. I brushed it off, because I may not have been good at magic, but I was _fantastic_ at brushing emotional reactions off as nothing. “Well, next to me older sister, I s’pose. She’s about the opposite of a girl, while still bein’ a girl, somehow. S’like she hates bein’ a girl so much, bein’ a tomboy isn’t enough, but she also hates men. So, I s’pose ‘conflicted’ is a good word for Gin. Anyway, ya dodged the question.” That was quite a surprise. I didn’t know he had a sister. Come to think of it, what did I know about him?

I still vividly recalled the feeling of being trapped, when he’d caught me staring, and I hadn’t found the strength to look away. I didn’t want a repeat experience. Currently, eye contact with him made me even more uncomfortable than normal. So I looked away from him, and looked at the yellowed trees in the cemetery through the glass door of the kitchen exit’s mudroom. I drummed my fingers on the glass, and the repetitive motion combined with the cold soothed me. “I liked to explore when I little, and I loved playing in the dirt in the Conservatory,” I confessed. “I don’t hate flowers, I just grew up disliking them because the alyssum in my mom’s flower garden made me sneeze whenever I would get into it. And the wisteria. And the gardenias. Some of them even give me rashes. Trees are fine, and most green plants are okay. Mom started growing anenomes and tulips and shit after I started having reactions, and they don’t make me sneeze, so I like them.”

“Oh, ye’re just allergic.”

Yes, for once, I had a reasonable explanation for a quirk. What a shock. “We should go,” I announced. “Nessa’s expecting us.”

He nodded. We started walking back through the kitchen to the main hall. “Right, we’re doddering. Nuff of that.” As we were leaving, he asked in a sly tone, “Say, what’s this project supposed to be about?” We were heading out the door front door, and now he asks me this?

I paused to shrug as we approached his car. “Iuhno. I usually just complain until Vanessa does it. She’s the only one who really cares about grades.” I opened the door to his white Accord and slid in.

He slid into the driver’s seat and rolled his eyes at me. At me! “Nice friend ya are.” I couldn’t tell if he was teasing or not from his tone.  
  
“She knows how I feel about grades,” I defended. “And how I feel about teamwork. And before you ask, I find both boring and terrible.”

“Didja _hear_ me ask? Because I didn’t ask.”

It felt odd that we could banter after only having known each other for around a month. It felt like I’d known him for longer.

We were out of the gates to Blackwood and were halfway to Vanessa’s house before we hit a stoplight. When we did, I felt the urge to tell him, “Grades are a sad attempt at standardize a veritable spectrum of intelligence. They’re pointless and stupid. And so’s school, for that matter. The only reason I go at all is because Nessa is there and I enjoy hanging out with her. Plus, I eventually want to get into college. Plus, the law says I have to go.”

He said nothing, but I saw him smirk out of the corner of my eye. The rest of the trip was silent, except for me giving him directions. Not that he seemed to need them, which was suspicious. Or maybe he had a good memory from when he dropped her off. Which would . . . Make a lot of sense, actually.

When we pulled into Vanessa’s mother’s ranch-style home, Lee turned off the car and looked at me askance. I felt my heart leap a little in my chest when we made eye contact again. I cursed in my head and looked away. “Do ya really just let ’er do all the work?” He asked.

Uh oh. He had a concerned-face. Concerned-faces about a topic turned the topic into a minefield. I thought very carefully about this answer. “She seems to like doing most of it,” I answered slowly. “I’m not a very artistic person, which is . . . there isn’t a kind way to call it obvious. So, if and when we have projects, she’ll take over the design and organization, and I’ll stick to the boring research stuff.” (I didn’t mention that this was really because Nessa no longer allowed me any say whatsoever in the creative process of our group projects, because of the things I had written about our teacher, Mr. Vanderhill, in the last paper she let me write. I tried to tell her that Scott was the one to blame, because he was right over my shoulder the whole time, encouraging me. Also, how was I supposed to know that Vanderhill was such a wipeout that he’d get his feelings hurt over a few playground insults? The big, blubbering baby.)

He nodded. “Fair enough. Just so you know, if she and I end up doin’ most o’ the work, I’ll curse yer bones til ya bleed outta yer eyes. Literally.”

Lee stepped out of the car on that flippant remark, leaving me to process what he’d just said. It was an odd note to leave on, and yet, oddly funny. When I got out and went after him, I was still laughing about it.

Vanessa’s house was a two-bedroom ranch home approximately at sea level, smack in the center of a suburb. I couldn’t tell you what color the house was, because the jungle of greenery surrounding it. I know that the back yard was no better - it was a controlled chaos rather than a garden, full of every possible plant, from hemlock to heather, that Sherece DuFrenne could ever need during her rituals. The inside of the house was just as nuts in a different way. I don’t think there was a single bit of free space on the DuFrenne home’s walls. Hanging masks, wall art, beaded curtains - it was delightfully chaotic and yet, somehow, comfortable. Every bit and bauble in there had its proper, artistic placement.

I’d learned over the years, you could never predict just what was a ritualistic totem in Sherece’s house and what wasn’t, so it was always best to ask before touching something. Even the walking sticks she kept up front weren’t safe, as I figured out when I got shouted at for tripping over the one that belonged to Alegba when I was fourteen. There were multiple altars to all sorts of different entities and deities - it felt like every one Sherece talked to had a corner reserved especially for them. Vanessa had tried explaining them all to me, and why certain ones had offerings and others didn’t. This was because I’d impulsively grabbed a little glass full of what I thought was water, sitting in front of a black statue of Sherece’s, because I was really thirsty. I’d never actually seen a shot glass before - well, maybe on TV, but not in person. My parents didn’t own a single shot glass. When they drank, it was always only a glass of mulled wine during dinner, or they’d break out the hard stuff after coming home from a funeral, and that stuff was always fine malt liquor poured out of a decanter. Or, sometimes they drank absinthe out of a brouille-absinthes. So, because I was an elitist snob, it honestly didn’t register with me. Of course it was straight vodka, and I almost hacked up a lung. Nessa was laughing for a week after that. It was the first time I’d tasted raw alcohol, and after that, I vowed to never touch the stuff again. After that disaster, Vanessa had to replace the offering for me and explain why it was there and why I shouldn’t touch anything, ever. I’d been wary of everything in her house ever since, and if I ever knocked any of the totems over, I was very careful to replace them with an apology to the attending deity. (Because you never know who you might be angering. I may be a magical dud, but I was not an idiot. Trafficking with higher entities that you don’t understand is a whole class of dumb.)

“Come in, try not to knock anything over, sorry ’bout the mess,” was Vanessa’s way of saying hello when she opened the door. Lee, who had never been inside her house before, let out a low whistle at all of the paraphernalia.

I followed him into the dim light, much more subdued. I quirked an eyebrow at Vanessa’s appearance. Her hair was pulled up in a messy half bun on top of her head and she didn’t appear to have changed out of her pajamas. “You look lovely,” I told her with an open-mouthed, cheery smile.

She rolled her eyes at me, and let out a yawn. “Shut up, I woke up an hour ago. I stayed up late helping Mama with a client.” Her mother, Sherece DuFrenne, is a voodoo witch doctor, and everyone in her neck of the woods is piss-terrified of the her. Doesn’t help that the woman dresses like an extra in a Lion King stage extravaganza. I was slightly obsessed with her.

I waggled my eyebrows. “Oooo, with what? Was it something nefarious? Was it a _séance_? A looo _oo_ oove hex?”

“None your business,” she shot back, putting her hands on her hips. She glanced at Lee, who was inches away from tapping a small gold statuette dressed in pink and turquoise sitting on a shelf next to a small clay jug of what smelled like wine. Vanessa immediately rapped his wrist, and he let out a defensive yelp. I snickered. “Erzulie doesn’t like men,” she told him, “like, at all, so be careful touching that. Just, know what, just don’t touch anything in here, okay? I don’t want a repeat of what happened when Fry first came over. I have PTSD flashbacks about my mama’s lecture.” I would’ve been mad at the implication, but in Vanessa’s defense, I did knock over a lot of shit back then. I didn’t even bother to pretend to disagree. She knew me too well.

Lee pouted and rubbed his knuckles. Big, adorable baby. Aww. Wait, that was a bad thought, damn it! “Wha’s it for?”

Nessa motioned for us to follow her to her room. As she led Lee (I followed) through the main entryway to her bedroom, she explained to the curious Lee, “Mama travels with them all in her work. A few more so than others. So, she’s gotta set presents out for them, or they get cross with her. It functions like a tollbridge.” While the DuFrenne’s had a certain reputation, Sherece never lacked for business, being the only real proprietor of her craft in the entire state (that I knew of). Her house was the way it was for good reason - again, it was controlled chaos. Her work was sacred to her, and it was always done in her sanctum - which pulled double duty as her home.

“Travels?” He wondered. From his tone, you’d think this was Christmas morning. What was he so excited about? “With who?”

“Loa. You haven’t heard of them?” I was also surprised, but only because I would’ve thought that this would have come up in conversation before now. I mean, we’d been all hanging out basically every day at school for about a month, and whatever, it just seemed like odd timing. Maybe I have paranoia problem.

“No,” he admitted. “I’d be keen to learn.”

“I guess that’s not so surprising,” Nessa sighed, turning to address us while walking backwards, “I mean, Mama, she was taught by this Haitian Creole mambo, when she still lived in Jamaica. People that use it as a craft usually don’t move far away from where they learned - I’m not sure why, it’s just a pattern that I’ve noticed. You know, like how the only circle of druids conveniently lives in Scotland?”

Lee nodded. “Oi, I’m familiar all right. They’re havin’ us all on, though, I hope you know.”

“Total hacks,” I agreed with him. “They have to know you can’t cause an earthquake just by praying really hard. Unless you’re praying to demons, I guess,” I added.

Lee smirked. “Depends on the demons, donnit?” He had a point, but suddenly, his smirk captured my interest.

Vanessa, as always brought reality back to the conversation. “Anyway, they’re the Loa, but they have lots of names. When Mama agrees to do something for a client, she talks to one or some of them, and they all help her with different tasks. You almost knocked over Erzulie back there. She’s the delicate one of the bunch - love, beauty, fineries. She likes shiny, expensive things, and she likes to be seen, so Mama always makes sure to prop her totem up front. ’Course, that means it gets knocked over a lot, which defeats the purpose, but whatever, I didn’t put it there. It’s her business.”

“It does seem like a bad place to put an altar,” I threw in.

“That’s what I said,” she agreed. “The only thing she’s worse at than listening is baking.”

I turned to Lee. “Her ma’s brownies are basically chocolate concrete. If she ever offers you one to eat, don’t. And definitely don’t tell her I told you not to eat it. She will probably kill me, and then I’ll be dead, and you’ll feel really bad.”

Vanessa stopped and pulled open her bedroom door. Lee had been staring at the walls, the ceiling, at just about everything and it seemed like he was soaking it all in. I guess he must not have been here before. If this was his reaction now, I couldn’t wait until he met Sherece. His head would probably explode. “We three are peas inna weird pod. What’re the odds?”

Nessa’s eyebrows scrunched up into her forehead. She looked to me. “Can you translate that?”

I shrugged.

“It was a compliment,” Lee muttered. I looked at him and shrugged again.

Nessa sighed. “Lemme grab what I have so far. Gimme a bit.” She popped into her room, and popped back out with her personal computer under her arm. She turned her head to Lee, who was raptly staring at a fabric painting of a jaguar -headed woman on the wall. He was lightly prodding the fabric art with the same finger he’d almost knocked the statue over with earlier. She then looked at me. “Let’s go outside,” she suggested worriedly, and grabbed Lee’s arm to drag him out to the patio, “where there isn’t anything for you to knock over.”

It took me less than ten minutes for me to become completely bored with the project. It took fifteen minutes for Vanessa to get fed up enough with my whining to closer her laptop and start lecturing me, which was a new record. Lee detracted from the fun by staying quiet and studying Vanessa’s scrawly notes. He seemed to be having some difficulty reading them, judging by his squint, but I wasn’t about to point that out. It was way more amusing to watch him pretend not to struggle. Nessa’s handwriting was neat, but she often used shorthand which made it difficult for anyone but her to read.

Thirty minutes into it and I still had no idea what was going on or even what we were supposed to be working on. I had a dilemma, then, because Vanessa was already irritated at me and would likely take offense if I asked her something so obvious, but at the same time, it was getting harder and harder to fake it. I eventually chickened out of asking either of my friends and pulled my knees up into the patio chair, and used my legs as a kind of easel for my own notebook, and started doodling.

Vanessa kept peeking at me over her laptop. I could tell she was getting suspicious by how quiet we were both being. I stole a glance at Lee, who stole a glance at me at the same time, and I was ninety percent sure that neither of us knew what the hell we were doing.

Nessa eventually asked, a little irritably, “hey Fry, what do you have so far?”

The jig was up. Time to fold. After no deliberation whatsoever, I blurted, “Okay, so I’ve thought about this for a long while Vanessa, and I’m absolutely convinced that it was Colonel Mustard in the study with a wrench killing Ms. Scarlet, because she was threatening to tell his wife - Mrs. Peacock - about her witnessing an affair between him and the maid, Mrs. White. Because he didn’t sign a pre-nup, Peacock would’ve divorced him and gotten the whole mansion, along with full custody of Professor Plum, who is their charmingly befuddled, progeriac child prodigy. Mr. Green was just a convenient scapegoat, but the real twist to this is that Green had been entangled in a four-year affair with Peacock, and was actually witness to Ms. Scarlet’s murder - but, when the Colonel couldn’t buy him off and he threatened to go to the police, Colonel Mustard pinned the murder on him.”

Vanessa was unamused. “No, just, no; although that reminds me that we do have to eventually finish that game with Uncle Scott,” she added. “I have a different theory about Mr. Green that would’ve knocked your slacks off.” Nessa affectionately referred to my godfather as my Uncle. He liked it, and I never corrected her. She and I both giggled at the word ‘slacks,’ and then looked to Lee. “Clue games with us basically last millennia. It’s, uh, kinda fun to role play with it.”

“Me sisters’ have been playin’ monopoly for three months,” he said, using wide eyes to emphasize how completely insane probably this sounded, and accepting our Clue bullshit in stride.

I whistled, impressed. “That’s pretty hardcore.”

His head bobbed in a nod. “Savage arsewipes robbed me right outta th’ game last month, and then forced me to be the banker!”

Vanessa started staring at me with creepy, squinty eyes. “You don’t have anything, do you,” she guessed, not entirely inaccurately.

I put down my doodle on the table for all to see. “I ha-a-ave an undead bunny eating brain-ice-cream. Does that count?” Vanessa facepalmed so hard she hit her forehead on her computer screen and hissed in pain.

Lee looked at her, concerned, and then examined my rendering. He grinned and pointed. “Aww! Lookit its ears!”

What? What was he ’aww’ing about? “No, see, the bunny is a zombie bunny. You know, bloodstained killer rabbit, ‘rawr.’”

“I know. It’s adorable,” he declared, like it was so obvious. His brows scrunched up. “You’re the worst kinda person to try and compliment, d’ya know that?”

“Tell me about it,” Vanessa muttered, and committed a double-facepalm. I frowned, and looked down at my doodle. I guess the bunny _was_ pretty cute, but I hadn’t been trying to make it cute. It was emotionally upsetting to me, on a deep, visceral level, that Lee found my undead bunny cute. I couldn’t figure out why it upset me, because that feeling, like all the other feelings I seemed to have for that weird boy, made no goddamn sense to me.

“Okay,” Vanessa said weakly from behind her hands. “Let’s just, ugh,” she pulled her face out of her hands and her soft brown eyes glared at me. “You, I expect this from, but Lee, you, come on, man - I can’t be the only responsible one here. Can we please just get this dumb thing done? I don’t wanna scramble like last time, that was kind of stressful.”

“Fine,” I relented, “but I’ll need to know what we’re supposed to be doing.” Vanessa chucked a crumpled piece of paper at my head, but the shot went wide and missed me pretty good. “Ouch,” I announced flatly. “You got me. I’ll never walk again.”

Lee looked at me skeptically. “Maybe ought to tell ’er twice,” he suggested helpfully. “And me once, ’cause, er, I don’t remember either,” he admitted sheepishly with a chuckle that I absolutely did not find adorable, at all, whatso-fucking-ever. Also, how did he already know me well enough to know I’d need to be told two, or sometimes three times? How is it that he fit in so well? And why was it not bothering me as much as it did a few weeks ago? Gods above, was I getting accustomed to him? I set down my doodlebook and frowned at my bunny.

Vanessa sighed again. She chuckled and rolled her eyes to the ceiling, her sour mood strangely evaporating. Normally this is the part she got all pissy at me during, and I usually let her badger me into doing my part. Now, with Lee there, she seemed to take everything in good humor. “I’m used to it. You know what, screw it,” she said carelessly, and closed her laptop. “I didn’t really want to do this today anyway.”

I was more than happy with this conclusion, and announced my joy by clapping with glee and quietly cheering ‘yay’ to myself. Lee smiled and Vanessa snorted back a laugh. My best friend tucked her laptop under her arm and opened up the door to the patio. Once inside, she popped her head back in, her expression becoming cautious. “Hey, so, I’m gonna make a snack,” she said slowly, “I’m thinking about maybe watching a movie, or some cartoons. Do you guys wanna watch something with me? Lee, you might meet my mama if you stay.” For a second there, it sounded like she was shy.

He shrugged. “I don’t have any plans.”

My pocket beeped. I pulled out my phone and saw a notification from Scott, who showed up as ‘Turd Farmer’ in my contacts because of legitimate reasons. The message seemed to be garbled and made no sense. It just read, ‘nws if fkd whar blffsmaaaa.’ I held up a finger and walked to the other end of the patio to call him. What was he even doing awake at this time of day? Before I could dial anything, I received an incoming call from my father. Alarmed, I walked to the other end of the patio and immediately picked up. Behind me, I heard Lee mumble something.

“Hi, Dad,” I answered automatically.

“Friday,” Marcus Colville breathed my first name out in relief. I heard a sigh. That sounded bad. His tone sounded worried. “Good. Are you at home?”

“No, at Vanessa’s,” I told him. I rarely went anywhere other than Vanessa’s, so unless one of them asked, I rarely told my parents where I was going. Additionally, I kept Scott apprised of my comings and goings, so if anyone ever needed me for something (which was never), they knew the best way to reach me was to simply ask him. “Lee drove me. Should I ask him to take me home?”

After a second of silence, he replied, “yes, that would be best. I received an alarming message at work, and I’d like everyone to be in the same room so we may discuss it together.”

Oh. So the death threats were happening again. “It wasn’t a very friendly message, then?”

“I expect the man who delivered it won’t be waking any time soon,” my father flippantly reported, “judging by the size of the indent in my wall that his skull made.” Oh. So someone had graduated straight from threat to _attempt_ , had they?

“So it was a _very_ friendly message,” I surmised. “They sound sloppy.”

My dad chuckled. “Quite. I’ll expect you home soon, dear. You should invite your friends over for dinner tomorrow, to make up for today.”

I pretend to grumble about this. “I don’t know, they have the eating habits of ravenous hobbits . . .”

“I’m sure neither of them are capable of anything worse than watching Scott take his meals.”

“Good point. I’ll be home in a few.”

“Very well. I’ll see you soon, dear.” And we hung up. We didn’t say goodbye on the phone; we never do. We rarely called or messaged in my family, except for Scott, who was the only person who would bug me with random shit, and I’m pretty sure I was the only person he did that to because he knew how much it irritated me.

When I turned around, I held up my arms in a shrug. “Raincheck?” I offered.

Nessa frowned. “Emergency?” She shot back. She knew Dad wouldn’t call unless it was about something Very Bad. Things that fall under the Very Bad category: someone is being arrested, someone is being murdered, someone needs help hiding a body, someone was bitten by a werewolf, someone didn’t snuff out the fireplace, or a mob was knocking on the door and asking to see our innards.

I wasn’t sure how bad it was, since Vanessa often transmitted anxiety through words and gestures, whereas my father was the polar opposite. I was pretty sure that my dad was some kind of unflappable supervillain. It was what I loved most about him. I shrugged. “Eh.” I waved my hand back and forth.

“What happened?” Lee was confused. “Is something wrong?”

I wasn’t sure how much I wanted Lee to know, but part of me (probably the corniest part of me that was always noticing how his eyes were the same color as a summer sky and shit) _wanted_ him to know, so I told him, “Someone or something tried to off my Dad while he was at work.” He stiffened in alarm, or excitement.

Nessa was less affected, but her posture tensed up. “But,” she objected, “it-it’s, like, noon. It’s barely noon. And a weekend! And why is your Dad working on the weekend?”

I thought about it for a second. “I think he was making case files. He likes to get ahead of his work for the next week on Saturdays.”

“Someone seriously just tried to—your father?” Lee appeared to be having some trouble with this concept. “This might be brainless to ask, but, is he alright?”

“He managed to call me,” I said dryly. “And he’s invited you both to dinner tomorrow, at seven.”

“But why?” Nessa rubbed her eyes. “What—you know what, nevermind, you gotta get home, okay? Text me later. You guys drive safe. Tell ’em all I said hi.”

Lee still looked unsure, but stood up and brushed off his pants. “Sorry I couldn’t meet yer mother,” he said to Vanessa. He looked over to me. “I’m ready when you are.”

“You’re probably gonna regret saying that,” Vanessa muttered and went back inside the house, leaving the patio door open behind her for us.

I received some other nonsensical text messages from Scott on the way out. I muted my phone and ignored them. Scott was clearly butt-texting me. Stupid nit, he was probably sitting in his chair in his “lair”, phone in his back pocket, mowing down twelve-year olds and badmouthing their mothers in funny accents into his headset. Lorcan almost knocked over Erzulie’s totem again on the way out, so I’m sure Vanessa was relieved when we left without incident.

I was pleasantly surprised when Lee held his passenger door open for me. As we took off, I wondered aloud, “hey did we learn what this project was supposed to be about?”

When he laughed, I melted a teeny bit. “Nope.”


End file.
